Vindicated
by Kaoru424
Summary: Abby's involvement with the victim of a recent case leaves Gibbs stuck between his head and his gut; it's hard to be cleared innocent when you've been caught red-handed...literally. Gabby.
1. Chapter 1

Abby wandered in the darkness. It was like walking on stilts while on acid. Dark colors in the moonlight swirled and swayed as her body did on her unsteady feet. She didn't know where she was or where she was going. All she could cearly feel at the moment was a desperate need for help...and escape. And, of course, she could feel the invisible bowling ball on top of her head. Fatigue gradually made her footsteps even wobblier - worse than her attempts at walking in high heels. It had been a long night, or at least that's what it seemed. Her body slowly started to ache.

Eventually, a few of her other senses came back to muted life. The light breeze made Abby shake and hug herself tightly. Some of the colors became brighter, possibly because of the streetlights; she recoiled and shuddered more at the bright sparks that made her head throb even more. She became aware of a faint metallic scent mixed with smoke fading away with every step she took. Something else metallic and rather rotten tickled her taste buds and nearly made her gag - _blood_.

_Help me - help me,_ she thought. But she couldn't open her mouth without pain. She thought she saw shadowy, human figures amidst the colors. Her vision got even blurrier before she could decipher them. A new taste entered the corners of her mouth... _Salty_. Tears.

Somehow there was always flat ground under her feet. Abby wanted to fall - long, down, and hard - if she had to go through anymore of this dark haze. A fragment of a memory entered her mind and just confused her even more. _Tonight...no fun...at all..._ Her thoughts were becoming fused into a melted goop in her brain, and she still didn't know where she was headed.

Abby stumbled on something - steps leading upward. She kept stumbling forward until she hit a wall. She groped around the blackness and found a knob. _A door?_ The rusty taste had turned into a poison, a sickening perfume. There was so much blood now, there couldn't possibly be anymore in her system. Panicking, she started hitting the door. When nothing happened, she balled her fingers into weak fists and banged harder.

The barrier suddenly swung open. Heart pounding, Abby kept hitting a softer surface before falling against it. Warm arms caught her. _A heartbeat. . ._

He couldn't believe who was standing in front of him. Blood everywhere - her hands, her shirt, her nose and mouth - he almost didn't recognize her, if it weren't for her bubbling green eyes.

"Abby?" he asked incredulously.

_Gibbs!_ she wheezed. The words couldn't reach her mouth. The darkness consumed her.


	2. Chapter 2

**A/N:** Thank you so much to everyone for all the faves, alerts, and reviews. I was really testing the waters with that first chapter - this has been an idea in my head for some time, and I wanted to see if anyone would be interested. Sorry for the delay, I just got back from a weekend trip, so that's partially why the first chapter was so short, I needed to put that out there before I left lol.

Note: Anything in _italics _is either a thought, a flashback, or otherwise just emphasized.

Anyway, sorry again for the suspense - here is Chapter 2... (--Annie)

* * *

The few moments leading up to answering the door were a blur to Gibbs. He vaguely remembered getting out of bed and hearing the rapping on the door. The one thing that he did remember clearly was seeing the last person he expected at his front door. His blue eyes still wide open, he kept a calm front and focused on the task at hand. He quickly carried Abby into his home and hurried to clean her up a little. Ducky wasn't answering, he guessed because of the ungodly hour on the clock. _What in the world is Abby still doing at four in the morning?_ he asked himself. He continued to wipe the blood off Abby's pale skin. Once the last drops were off to the best of his ability, Gibbs looked down at the white towels stained with crimson. A surge of anger rushed over him for a moment; some sick bastard must have done this to her.

He shifted back to Abby. Underneath the blood were bruises everywhere. Her forehead was deep purple, her nose violet-fuscia, and her mouth dark red. Her pigtails were missing, and a river of black hair lay in a mess. Gibbs saw the remaining blood on her black-and-white shirt and dark mini-skirt. Above her black chunky boots were some abrasions he hadn't seen.

Gibbs threw the bloody rags on his coffee table. He knelt down and brushed away a lock of hair from Abby's face - when his phone rang. It was Ducky.

"What seems to be the problem at his hour, Jethro?"

"Ducky, I found Abby covered in blood and barely able to stand," the frown on Gibbs' face was practically audible.

"Oh dear..." There was shuffling in the background before Ducky came back on the line. "How did this happen?"

"I don't know, Ducky," Gibbs answered, a little annoyed. He would have asked the same question, among millions at that moment. Too many questions, too little answers... "I hear rapping on my door, and the second I answer it, Abby's about to collapse." He remembered catching her... Gibbs looked down, sighing, at the blood that inevitably got on his shirt.

"Well, we will get to the bottom of this," Ducky assured. "I'll be there as soon as I can."

After Gibbs hung up, he gazed over Abby once again. Different feelings brewed in his gut, but he didn't want to act on them that instant. Going out into the mysterious night would be going out and abandoning Abby.

He touched the side of her cheek with his fingers. "We _will_ get to the bottom of this, Abbs," he whispered, quoting Ducky. Then he headed upstairs to change.

Twenty minutes later, Ducky arrived. Gibbs gave a brief overview of the visible injuries and showed him the bloodstained towels and his bed shirt on the coffee table.

"Dear..." Ducky couldn't finish his interjection. He stared between the blood rags and Abby for some time. "Hmm. There's still a bit more cleaning to do on her wounds, not to mention anything else Abigail has endured. But I _cannot_ imagine her immersed in her own blood..."

Gibbs frowned at the crimson rags. "Keep those, Ducky," he said and pointed to the contents on the coffee table.

"Of course - depending on how this turns out, that could be potential evidence."

Gibbs' frown deepened. "I don't want to go there yet. Is she okay?"

Ducky made a face. "So far a slightly fractured nose and a mild concussion. She still has a pulse."

Gibbs ran a hand down his face.

The ME continued to examine Abby, his silent audience member. "Oh, Abigail. What twist of fate delivered you from your...._grisly _doom, to the front steps of Jethro's house? Conscious of the fact or not, my dear, you made the smartest choice to come here - it is a sanctuary, really...." Ducky turned and noticed Gibbs leaving the room. "Uh, Jeth - ?"

Gibbs cut him off and glanced back at him. "Stay with Abby. I'm going out to investigate." He walked faster-paced down the foyer.

"Where's the fire, Jethro?" Ducky raised his voice.

Gibbs spun around and wore a tense gaze. "I don't _know_, Ducky - but I can smell the smoke." With that, Gibbs shut the door and followed his nose.

*** *** ***

Under the suburban streetlights, Gibbs keenly observed his surroundings. The sky was a dull indigo, getting brighter as the hour passed. There wasn't anything out of the ordinary on either side of his street. He was certain that he didn't hear a vehicle drive away when he heard Abby at the door. She had to have walked, in her state no less. Stray drops of blood on the sidewalk confirmed it, coming from his right. Gibbs started eastward down the cement walk. The few blood drops turned into a thin trail of red dots continued east. His gut wasn't making him feel any easier. If it had to come down to catching the bastard right then and there, he was armed and ready. Justice would be served...

The trail thinned out at the corner of Gibbs' street and the main road. A new feeling crossed his mind: he was afraid for Abby.

He knew that wasn't Abby's car, blocks down the road. Crushed against a cement construction barricade. A thin cloud steadily rising from the crumpled hood. The growing fear made Gibbs jog forward nonetheless. _What happened there, Abby? What _really _happened?_ He should have sensed something from the day before...

_"Guess who has a hot date tonight?"_

_McGee stopped typing at 200-words-a-minute and stared. "_You?_" he asked with a sincerely uncertain inflection._

_Tony's head rose from his desk. He was half awake without a doubt and had the bed-hair to prove it. "Whose-uh-date??" he mumbled. His sleepy head fell back onto his desk before anyone answered him._

_Ziva laughed. "For once, Tony is not the man on the camp."_

_McGee blinked. "Uh, Ziva, I think you mean, 'big man on campus.'"_

_Ziva tisked._

_"_Ha_," Tony snickered under his breath._

_The Israeli mossad shot Tony a glare. "I thought you were supposed to be asleep."_

_"And I thought everyone was supposed to be _doing_ something."_

_Gibbs entered the bullpen, drinking a fresh cup of coffee. Whatever nonsense they were talking about, he only heard parts of it. He immediately saw Abby at the opposite end of the pen. She was bright and sunny like that very morning, despite her everyday dark garb. The team's favorite forensic specialist skipped forward and stopped Gibbs in his tracks._

_"Hi Gibbs," Abby smiled and waved at him, even though he was probably less than a foot's length from her._

_"Hey Abby," Gibbs hid his crooked grin behind his coffee cup and took a quick swig. He sat down on the edge of his desk; he had the feeling Abby needed someone to talk to._

_"Well, before you ask Gibbs," the Gothic girl talked with her hands, "I was just here because...well, because....I dunno." She put a finger to her lips. "I __got bored in my lab." She blinked at the odd thought. "I just felt all cramped and alone for some reason. Bert and my babies were just smiling at me and Ducky and Jimmy weren't in yet, so I came up and kind of bothered everyone -"_

_"You did not bother us, Abby," Ziva smiled. McGee nodded in agreement._

_"I mean," Abby shrugged, but smiled at her friend's words, "we just finished a case and I just wanted to say hi Gibbs."  
_

_Gibbs smiled. He couldn't argue with that. "You're not in trouble, if that's what you're thinking, Abbs." He patted the side of her arm. "It's nice to see you."_

_"Thanks Gibbs," Abby warmly smiled._

_Tony's snore ripped through the airwaves._

_"_DiNozzo!"_ Gibbs barked._

_"Y'boss," Tony uttered and squinted at both Gibbs and Abby sitting together on the desk._

_"Tony-baloney," Abby sneered and folded her arms playfully._

_Tony's mouth opened, closed, and then opened again. "_You're_ the one with the hot - ?"_

_Gibbs stare-glared Tony to a halt._

_"... Shutting up now, boss," Tony frantically typed at his keyboard._

_Abby giggled to herself. "I'll head back to the lab now. My work here is done," she said._

_Gibbs settled into his computer chair and looked up at her. "Stay there for now - and be good."_

_"Yes sir," Abby saluted._

_"Don't call me sir," Gibbs pointed at her._

_"Yes ma'am!" And she marched out of the bullpen._

_Gibbs had the hardest time hiding the grin spreading across his face. He made a note to bring her her Caf-Pow later._

_But first, his curiosity got the better of him. Or rather...he grew unusually _suspicious.

_After looking through a few files left on his desk, Gibbs got up without a word and stalked toward Tony's desk. He rested one of his hands on the back of the computer chair and looked over the field agent's shoulder. Tony's fingers eventually ceased typing his case report._

_"Yes boss?" Tony froze, most likely expecting a micro-managing rampage._

_"'The hot _what_, DiNozzo?" Gibbs asked plain and simply._

_Tony gulped. "I-I. . .I'm not sure of what you. . .mean - Boss."_

_Smack!_

Before Gibbs could finish sifting through yesterday's events, he was already at the scene of the crime.

_No. Don't assume anything, dammit._

He approached the accident.

The black, otherwise nondescript sedan was something Abby wouldn't drive if she had the choice, Gibbs knew for sure. Coming in from the back of the vehicle, he memorized the plate. The shotgun door was wide open. Gibbs carefully stepped to it and scanned inside. Traces of more blood above the glove compartment and some on the seatbelt caught his eye. A familiar bag, also messily stained with red, lay under the drink holders. Moreover, what was on the other side made Gibbs transfer to the driver's door immediately.

His phone rang on cue. Gibbs gripped the car handle with one hand and grabbed his phone with the other.

"_Yeah_," he snapped.

"Pardon me, Gibbs," Ducky spoke after a short pause, "but have you found anything that could help us demystify Abby's predicament?"

Gibbs glanced through the car window. "Not exactly."

"Then I think you should get back here," Ducky said anxiously.

Gibbs knuckles turned white and looked away from the car. "How's Abby?" he demanded.

"Fine for now – I still need to examine her further, but I believe she would want you here if she were awake."

Gibbs noticed the tension building his body. He sighed. "Ducky, I didn't find _anything_ – "

He tugged on the latch – it opened, much to his surprise. Gibbs backed away and grimaced.

"I found a body."

* * *

**A/N:** Btw, should I change the rating to M instead of T ? With all this blood (and now the dead!) going around... Review with what you think :)


	3. Chapter 3

**A/N:** Thanks guys for the helpful comments. I don't think I'm ready to write any Gabby smut any time soon (so, sorry to those who _were _ready to read some XD), and I'll try to keep the gore to a happy, T-rated minimum. My writing "style" is a work in progress, so thanks to everyone who was constructively critical, if that makes sense... I put more time and words into this than the last chapter; so much had to go into this installment, as you will soon see. I wanted one more flashback with Abby in the lab before Gibbs and the gang dove into the scene. Sorry for any possible inaccuracies or typos (even though this is a fanfic, I try my best to stay neat and true ^_^;; ) If there are any, I'll try to rectify them ASAP! Bah, enough from me - Chapter 3 awaits! (--Annie)

* * *

_Caf-Pow in hand, Gibbs took the stairs instead of the elevator. He didn't care how he got there; he just needed to escape DiNozzo and McGee's constant bickering before he had to smack another field agent... Looking at the jumbo-sized caffeinated drink, the coffee drinker still couldn't understand why Abby consumed it in such amounts. He remembered spitting out the only (putrid) taste of Caf-Pow he ever had. He had to laugh – Abby wasn't fazed by his reaction at all._

_As long as Abby enjoyed it, her daily dose of caffeine was Gibbs' excuse to visit the lab – besides the usual evidence updates. No Caf-Pow (or no new updates), no need to visit her._

_Though, Gibbs stopped to think, there were times when he wished he had dropped by, simply because. Times when Abby was alone and probably needed something._

_Or someone._

_She would never admit it, or ever admit in time. Like when she had not one, but two stalkers preying on her. He wanted to be there when the next wacko wanted her dead, or wanted her all to himself. He wanted to protect her – he needed to. He only wished she would let him._

_On top of it all, the special agent stood uncertain of his feelings, feelings his gut couldn't or wouldn't clarify. That's what he always thought; he didn't know _what_ he felt when it came to Abby..._

_For now, he was content being Abby's boss, friend, and Caf-Pow supplier. Maybe today would be the day he would stay behind to see the grin of satisfaction on her face when she took that first sip..._

_Except he was still standing at the doorframe, still holding the Caf-Pow._

_And Abby wasn't just grinning with satisfaction; she was basking in it._

_She giggled with glee like a little girl and twirled her hair around her ungloved finger. All while she talked softly on her cell phone. It was cute. _She_ was cute._

_His gut, however, wouldn't leave him alone._

"_M-hmm," he cleared his throat._

_Abby's eyes lit up and she spun away, her back now facing him. Gibbs closed the distance in a matter of strides._

"_Right. I'll see you there," she practically mouthed into the phone. Nothing could escape Gibbs' canine hearing, though, and her last sentence was crystal clear. She hung up and began to turn in her computer chair. "Hi Gibbs, I – _whoa!_" Her eyes widened at what distance was left between them. "Gosh, how do you do that?"_

_Gibbs cocked a brow and held up her drink._

"_Don't answer that, I already know," she said quickly. She kept grinning from ear to ear as she took the beverage out of his hand and slipped her arm around his neck in one swift motion. "You always know when I need a little pick-me-up."_

_Her happiness spread like a virus. Gibbs pretty soon mirrored Abby's smile, even when he came face to face to question her. "Who was that?"_

_Abby's smile faded a little. "A friend," she answered._

_Gibbs' look was both hesitant and wary, but intense as always. "A friend?"_

_Abby gazed behind her thick lashes. "Yes, my silver-haired fox." She placed her hands on his shoulders. "A friend."_

_Gibbs eyed her phone lying next to the keyboard._

"_You have nothing to worry about, Gibbs," he heard her say. "Even if I was...if I was ambushed by ninjas in the dead of night – I could take care of myself. Then...I probably wouldn't be ambushed by ninjas in the first place....but then, where would they come from, and why would they attack me...?" Her brow furrowed at the serious matter of ninjas and surprise attacks._

_Gibbs turned his attention back to Abby; she had become the female Gothic version of _The Thinker _sitting in one of the rolling chairs. He rested his hand on her shoulder and brought the pigtailed statue back to life. A smart bit of wisdom stood at the tip of his tongue, but the lonely jumbo Caf-Pow stared intently at Gibbs from the desktop._

"_Aren't you going to drink that?" he asked._

_She held his gaze a second longer than he expected, then hurriedly spun away from it. Gibbs' hand fell from her shoulder and dropped to his side. She began to inhale the drink almost immediately._

"_Thanks again – Gibbs," she chirped between slurps._

_Maybe he was being paranoid, but he couldn't help worrying about his Abby._

_He leaned in behind her and watched the goosebumps form on her neck from the touch of his breath. "I'm always here for you, Abbs." He paused. "We all are."_

_Abby turned in her seat, and she stared back at Gibbs with a knowing glint in her eyes. "Same to you, too." She tilted her head and simpered; her cheeks flushed faintly._

_Gibbs wore a lopsided grin. He pressed his lips against her cheek and kissed Abby goodbye._

_*** *** *** ***_

"Gibbs has been the silent one since we arrived here," Ziva observed. She thumbed through pictures she had taken so far on the camera's memory card.

Tony folded his arms. "Not to mention the _pissed_ one," he grumbled.

Ziva scoffed, "I see he is not alone, if what you say is true." She stepped closer to him and scanned him closely. "You're the only one not doing his job right now," she hypothesized. "That's why."

The senior field agent was staring at the morning clouds and was paying no attention to Ziva's scrutiny. "Abby's still asleep." He shook his head and kicked some dirt off the ground.

"What was that?" Ziva squinted at him, questioning his random actions.

"Why would Abby want to kill someone?"

"Tony," Ziva gaped in disbelief, "we don't know anything for sure. I'm surprised you did not consider her innocence."

"I never said I didn't," Tony rejoined. He looked back uneasily at the clouds. "Am I the only one that finds it weird, in the creepy, horror-movie-killer sense, to carry a _box-cutter_ on your person?"

Ziva laughed darkly. "I carry two firearms _and_ a knife, Tony."

"Yes, but you're Ziva, Ziva. Abby's not an assassin or a field agent....nor does she open supply boxes in the back of a Wal-Mart truck."

The Israeli snickered. "She _does_ open evidence boxes, sometimes with a box-cutter if it's that type of box."

"In the lab, Ziva - in the lab, _for_ the lab."

"Thanks, Captain Obvious," McGee chimed in. "Like we all didn't know that." The cyber agent carried a box of bagged-n-tagged evidence – one of the contents being a bloody box-cutter knife.

Tony shuddered. "Yeah, Probie, just put it in the back already." He walked away and headed for Ducky's van, back to his post.

"What's with Tony?" McGee asked after he put up the evidence box.

Ziva peered through her camera lens. "I'm sure you feel it too, McGee."

McGee carefully stepped down from the NCIS truck and adjusted his cap. "The breeze?" he asked.

"No," Ziva said coolly. The camera lens rested on her desired target. "The wrath of Gibbs." _Snap!_

Yellow caution tape squared off the entire block where the car and construction barriers were. A black Chevy Neon had crashed into a cement road block between 0300 and 0400. The bloodied victim was silenced with duct tape and handcuffed to the steering wheel of the vehicle. Authorities were called to close off the area, but the team was summoned as soon as it was confirmed that the victim was a dead seaman.

McGee was heading back to the vehicle to check the backseat and trunk, Tony was climbing back inside Ducky's van to look after Abby, and Gibbs, Ducky, and Palmer were examining the body.

Gibbs' face was cold, his blue eyes a hue darker and detached in the morning sun. He stared intently at the seaman's face, particularly his cheek. He first thought it was a bruise on his skin, but after a closer inspection, the shape was identifiable. Gibbs tisked to himself; the maroon shade of the lipstick had misled him.

"Time of death…" Ducky pulled out the thermometer from the body. "Hmm."

Something red, other than the puddles of blood on the victim's shirt, distracted Gibbs briefly, but his patience ran thin. "_Time_, Duck?"

"Just as I thought," the ME frowned. "About ten or so hours ago." He packed away the thermometer. "Your boy died _before_ the crash, if your estimated time of the accident is correct."

Gibbs reached for the bright red, metallic object from the pant pocket of the victim. He held it in his hand and let the thoughts and initial feelings run wild.

It was Abby's cell phone.

"This was no accident," he glowered at the new piece of evidence. "A toolbox didn't _accidentally_ appear on the gas pedal, and the brakes weren't _accidentally_ broken." Her cell phone slid into an evidence bag.

Ducky frowned. "My mistake, Gibbs."

Gibbs rose and walked away.

Ducky took off his hat and took a deep breath. Palmer watched the special agent with a questioning look in his eyes.

"I believe I might have an answer to your question that's obviously troubling you, Mr. Palmer," Ducky said.

The medical assistant shook out of his thoughts. "What was that, doctor?"

The ME zipped his bag. "It appears this case has become a personal matter for Special Agent Gibbs."

Palmer moved to the head of the body while Ducky had already gone to the feet. "Are he and the victim connected in any way?" the former asked the latter.

"Not to my knowledge, no," Ducky shook his head. "But." He raised his index finger. "Gibbs is certainly more than connected to our dear Abigail."

Palmer nodded. If he had heard the ME right, the idea was hard to wrap his brain around, but it seemed to fit. He continued to watch the special agent leave; the bag containing Abby's cell phone crinkled in his gloved fist.

All of the pieces were creating a picture Gibbs didn't want to see. At this point he wasn't sure if they had all the pieces they needed. Everything so far made sense, and everything so far didn't make sense. The only other red-eye witness saw just about the same things as Gibbs did….except for a blood-bathed Abby.

Given the circumstances, Abby's survival was a miracle. When Gibbs thought he'd be relieved, he was only bogged further with questions. Why did only _she_ survive? Why was she in a car rigged for death and destruction? Why and how did her cell phone end up in a dead man's pocket?

_Why didn't you call me, Abby?_

"McGee!" Gibbs barked.

The other agent was on his way back to the truck with more evidence: a roll of duct tape and other contents found in the trunk. Gibbs shoved the bagged cell phone at McGee.

He needed to see her again.

McGee stumbled back and caught the extra bag with one of his less occupied hands. "So do we know any more about our dead seaman, Boss?"

"Besides the fact that he _was_ a seaman who was presumably with Abby last night – _no, we don't_."

McGee fell silent. He wanted to say more, but Gibbs had left him standing there with the bags of evidence to go to Ducky's van. The younger agent could feel another pair of eyes on him before he could move again.

"Do you feel it now, McGee?"

McGee rolled his eyes and spun around. Ziva stood looking at him through her camera lens. Her lips curved in a mischievous smirk when she took a surprise snapshot of his face, the expression of which must have amused Ziva greatly, since she started chuckling as well.

The male agent tried to put on a lighthearted front, but his boss's "wrath" remained with him. He turned back to Gibbs, who was now standing with Tony outside the ME's van.

"Hey." Ziva stood next to McGee and put a hand on his shoulder. She didn't say any more, but her eyes held a comforting concern.

"I'm fine," McGee answered and patted her hand. "I'm not sure about Gibbs, though."

Ziva's hand left his shoulder. "Indeed," she said. "I would be..._on edge_, too, if someone I loved was caught in danger."

McGee almost corrected her, but he realized she was completely right. The idea never sat well with McGee, but he never thought it was impossible. Just highly improbable. Gibbs had always hinted to fancying the Director when she was alive; moreover, Abby spent the night with another man...

Who was now dead.

So many ideas rushed into McGee's imagination, one after the other, he needed to write them down as possible twists in his novel. They weren't impossible. Just highly improbable. _Highly_.

At the van, Tony peeked inside and saw Abby, the team's very own Dark Angel, sleeping peacefully. Her head was wrapped with a bandage, and her nose and lips were dressed accordingly. Her deathly fear of hospitals was respected, and so Ducky planned on bringing her to NCIS as soon as they were finished at the scene. Her clothes were put in evidence boxes; an unflattering NCIS body suit replaced her apparel. She lay in an extra stretcher, the ones Ducky and Palmer used for the dead. Tony felt another chill run down his spine. From what he'd learned, Abby was a breath away from ending up in a body bag, and here she was lying in the back of Ducky's van anyway.

She began to stir and frown in her sleep. Tony held his breath. Abby shifted to her side and touched her pillow.

"Gibbs. . ._Gibbs_," she softly moaned.

Tony blinked.

"DiNozzo."

Tony looked over his shoulder. Speak of the devil.

Gibbs beckoned him to come outside. The senior field agent gulped, but didn't keep his boss waiting. What was waiting for Tony was the famous, versatile stare from Gibbs that never failed to produce his desired effect. Abby's moaning kept Tony from thinking clearly for a second, but he recovered in time.

"She's doing fine," he answered Gibbs' unspoken question. "I heard her t-talking in her sleep, but other than that, she hasn't done anything else or gone anywhere since she's been in there." Tony cleared his throat. "Um, how late did you say you found her?" He needed something to distract himself from his own disturbing thoughts.

Gibbs looked over Tony's shoulder. "Too late," he answered tersely. He went inside the van without any further word.

The senior field agent heaved a sigh of relief he didn't know he was holding.

Gibbs stepped inside and left DiNozzo to figure out what to do. He sat beside the stretcher in a nook created by the van's storage compartments. Before he knew it, Gibbs was holding Abby's hand, feeling a heaviness spread inside him. It started in his heart and made its way through his veins, until he could feel a warmth when he gently hugged Abby's fingers.

"Gibbs?"

Gibbs looked up from their fingers' embrace.

Abby stared teary-eyed at him and squeezed his hand.

"Gibbs, I'm sorry I – "

"Shh…" He placed a finger over her trembling lips. "You're safe now."

"I'm sorr - I'm sorry, Gibbs, I'm sorry," she sobbed.

"You're safe, Abbs, don't be. No one can hurt you now."

Abby only cried harder. She moved away from him and rested on her back. Gibbs thought she would choke on her own tears. He gripped her hand. "Abby – " he frowned.

"I killed him, Gibbs," she silently screamed. "I killed him, I killed him –"

Gibbs' heart stopped.

Her jade eyes slowly drooped. "I killed him….I killed…Ja…son."

* * *

**A/N:** The first person(s) who can correctly guess either (a) the NCIS episode, or (b) the Law and Order: Criminal Intent episode this story is clearly loosely based off of will be written into the story (e.g. use their username in the dialogue/context, write their real-life persona into the story as a "walk-on role," whatever I can think of! :D ) _Happy Googling!_


	4. Chapter 4

**A/N: **Congrats to **lunarmoth131** and **STLFAN** for winning the NCIS portion of the "challenge"! Yay! Unfortunately, the part I've written up for y'all didn't fit in this chapter, but it certainly will be either in the next chapter or the one after that - don't worry, you'll see -_-;;

Also, I always have this strange, unhealthy feeling that I've screwed up at least one thing about NCIS and/or the Navy in each chapter. I did some research on things like ranking and aircraft carriers, etc. I dunno, even though I watch the show like crazy, I always mess up on remembering details like that, gah.

Oh! **P.S.** The CI episode guess is still open! **BIG hint!:** it's the way the victim was found that is loosely based off the victim of _this _CI episode... Hope that helps!

Now it's time for me to shut up and let y'all enjoy some Gabby-ness :) (--Annie)

* * *

The dull white lights of the elevator shone in Gibbs' peripheral vision. Ziva's monotonous voice, void of any biased emotion, and with the sole purpose of reporting the information to Gibbs, read the database profile of their victim. His senses were still submerged in a stupor and only picked up the essentials. Their victim was assigned to the _USS Enterprise_ docked at Newport, before its last voyage. He was young ("…just turned 27…"). He was exceptionally bright ("…often gave technical assistance on board…"). He was a model seamen ("…no criminal record…").

He was almost too perfect.

"If you're here to see Seaman Jason Knight, you're a bit early. I've only just begun." Ducky remarked and tapped the seaman's lips with a scalpel.

Gibbs' mind cleared. He and Ziva entered the morgue, where the light and overall atmosphere seemed, not surprisingly, lifeless. Their dead seamen lay under a halogen-bright light. He had brown hair, a prominent nose, and a soft cleft chin. Deep in his ashen abdomen were sloppy slash marks and stab wounds, some deeper than others. His neck was strangely stained with light, lavender smudges, with his forearms and wrists bearing a similar hue.

Without thinking, Gibbs bumped into the next table behind him and startled Ziva and himself. He didn't even know he had taken a step back from the body. He glanced behind him out of caution.

The evidence boxes holding the blood-stained clothes sat at the foot of the table. Gibbs placed his palm on the metal surface; it was still warm. Someone had been lying there; _someone_ was gone.

Suddenly, his blue eyes darted around the rest of the room. He was silent for a while in his futile search, and gained quizzical looks from the two others in the room. Ducky tucked away an interesting thought of what Palmer's expression would look like if the lad were in the room, but the doctor shook his head.

"But judging by your...._acute _attention to the victim, I see you have something else on your mind."

Gibbs' nerves settled at the sound of his statement. The agent rested the heels of his hands on the edge of the warm examination table. His cold eyes rested on the ME.

"If you're here to see her, you're late. For once."

"Where is she?" he only asked.

"In the showers - the girl was an absolute wreck." Ducky thoughtfully tapped the scalpel on the seaman's face a few more times.

Gibbs was halfway to the doors in mid-sentence.

"Jethro," Ducky said a bit exasperated.

Gibbs stopped in the doorway.

"Go easy on Abigail – _please_."

Ziva looked at Gibbs and nodded.

The agent shifted glances between them, and then stormed off.

The ME heaved a sigh. "Care to stay for the show?" he asked out of the blue and waved his scalpel like a wand. "It'd be nice to have half a living audience listening to me, than to have an entire audience fully alive ignoring me." He eyed the most recently used exit.

Ziva kindly declined. She craned her neck to see her boss depart; she would have gone with him, but she felt it more appropriate to leave him alone.

The elevator bell rang, once the doors slid to a close, and - for a split moment - framed the face of a tortured man.

Ziva blinked. "Gibbs is going to the _showers_ with Abby?"

Ducky couldn't move his scalpel through the dead flesh. "Oh dear."

*** *** *** ***

Abby ripped off her body suit and flung it off to the side. She did the same with the little garments left on her body and disappeared into one of the showers. That's all she wanted to do: _disappear_.

Her memory of last night had been reduced to fragments and dull images. She remembered swirling lights…dancing…kissing…a huge blur of fun.

There were also swirling lights that followed pain…struggling…_bleeding_…along with bits and pieces of tangled, or mangled metal, and walking through darkness.

She hugged herself. Another piece of the film reel came back to her. _Walking….a cruel breeze….stumbling over steps….falling into someone's arms….feeling someone's heartbeat…and the smell of…._sawdust.

Abby gasped. A different kind of pain overwhelmed her. She held back tears that threatened to fall as she turned on the water. She wanted it hot, _scalding_ hot. She wanted to wash away everything and let the heat sear into her skin.

Abby was so infuriated at herself she could shoot something, but she was so confused, so lost and terrified – and the only one she really wanted to pour her feelings out to was the one person who could lock her away forever.

Abby knew something grave had happened and she was somehow caught in the middle of it; she _didn't_ know that she had accused herself of murder earlier that morning. The scent of blood and the soreness in her body were so vivid – surely that must have been her own blood. _Wasn't it? _Abby didn't know what to do with herself when Ducky told her what she had unconsciously done when she woke up in the morgue.

Being a hopeless optimist, the forensic specialist tried to focus on a better, more soothing memory that she could recall: _Gibbs….he's so warm and fuzzy on the inside. _She giggled.

Abby, for the first time that day, could feel a smile forming across her cheeks. She didn't think she deserved his being there, but he was there, for some strange reason, holding her hand. She never wanted to let him go.

Feeling the water running tepid, Abby shrunk into the corner of her shower chamber and hugged her knees. Her eyes opened reluctantly; Abby started to shiver.

Whenever she thought of Gibbs, her silver-haired fox, she always felt like she was a little girl crushing on her fifth grade teacher again. He was simply a dream - so close but so far away. Rule #12 was a giant red stop sign in Abby's way, not to mention the noticeable distance between them in age. Regardless, she liked to believe they shared a special bond no one else had. They even had a "secret language" like other couples....but, Abby knew, American Sign Language wasn't exactly undisclosed to the world. Thinking of Gibbs only made her head ache in the end; she had a feeling something else ached inside her, but she never dared to uncover it.

Abby pouted. Thinking in general wasn't helping her anymore. Neither did crying – she was empty of tears. She let the water run forever.

She didn't hear the room door open or close. She didn't notice the quiet footsteps coming up to her shower chamber and stopping right at the shower next to hers. There were no curtains – just a barrier of silence. The barrier closing off Abby seemed to take bodily form in the cloud of mist rolling from the shower.

It was so thick, Gibbs couldn't see Abby at all.

For a minute, Gibbs really thought Abby had taken someone's life….someone she obviously held some type of interest in. He took her words as a conscious confession, and everything after that was fueled by his anger. And his anguish.

Gibbs ran a hand down his perspiring face. It was getting hot with all the steam clouding around him. He took off his blazer, sunk down to the floor, and set his blazer on his crossed legs.

From what he heard, from her maroon lips to his sharp ears, she had killed him, killed him, killed him. The words just tumbled from her mouth and wouldn't stop.

Gibbs buried his face in his hands. Her dead eyes, her face numb with sadness and panic, were clear in his head. _Was any of this clear in _her_ head…?_ He asked himself.

Her "confession" was what led Gibbs to leave Abby in Ducky's van. After that, he drove alone in his own car back to NCIS and stayed in the bullpen for as long as he could. He hadn't seen Abby since then.

Abby hummed a vaguely familiar tune. The melody was reminiscent of a children's song he couldn't put his finger on. Gibbs smiled to himself.

The agent kept his gaze to his right, well away from the shower and any view of indecency… He didn't want to come off as a lecherous boss; he was well aware of how hated he was already and didn't want to add more to his "dirty old bastard" status.

"If only Gibbs could see me now," Abby chuckled to herself. "He probably doesn't want to see me – now, or ever."

Gibbs' heart melted. He gulped, looking down. "You're probably right," he said aloud.

Abby gasped and backed away from his voice.

Gibbs turned his head so he could only see the discarded body suit on the floor in front of him. He hesitated. "I need to see you, Abbs."

Abby stood up in a defensive demeanor. "Gibbs, I'm gonna trust that you can't see me butt naked."

Gibbs opened his mouth.

"DON'T COME ANY CLOSER!"

"Abby," he said emphatically, but he nearly laughed, "I'm nowhere near you."

"So," she faltered, "so are you the Gibbs voice in my head…?" Abby knocked on the shower wall she'd been leaning against.

Gibbs laughed at last and knocked the neighboring wall. "Hello, Abby."

Abby blushed. She didn't know what scientific method of thinking she was using, or if she had turned off her brain completely. "Hi Gibbs," she greeted with a small smile in her voice. "Sorry about…that."

"Don't be sorry, Abbs," he was still grinning. His grin turned lopsided when he said, "I just wanted to see you before…" He hated to be the one to remove the smile from Abby's face, even though he couldn't see it. "…Before I have to question you."

Abby sunk back down in her corner. "Gibbs," she more than frowned, "about what I said – "

"I'm going to forget you ever said anything but my name."

Abby raised her brows. She felt more than relieved, and the words had a certain ring to them that made her smirk. "Gibbs – " she smiled.

"I'm not letting you off the hook – know that," he cut her off. "You were the closest one to the victim last night. I can't ignore that."

The fuzzy-Gibbs feeling fizzled away. Abby stepped toward the light still clouded in mist; she couldn't see Gibbs.

The broken film reel started rolling in her head: _more struggling….more pain…shouting at someone....a dimly lit warehouse. And Jason…_

Abby shook her head. "Gibbs," her voice shrank while she remained standing in the shower. "Do you really think I could kill someone?"

It was the question that stood at the tip of everyone's tongue. The looks on his team's faces spoke louder than their hesitant assents to his orders. Gibbs couldn't let go of that scarlet-drowned Abby, totally helpless at his front step.

Then again, the blood could have been Seaman Knight's. Gibbs remembered the twinge of an unfamiliar feeling; he'd never heard Abby say a man's first name the way she had in front of him.

"I can't say, Abbs," was his answer. A pretty lame answer after he let it echo in his mind a few times. "Not until I interrogate you," he added. That only made it sound worse.

The water abruptly came to a stop. Gibbs, in anticipation, got up from the floor and turned around.

Abby stuck her head out from her shower and gasped when she saw him looking at her. Gibbs stared at her with equally round eyes. Her porcelain arm was dripping with water. His eyes lingered on the tattoos he didn't notice before that were imprinted on her forearm. Gibbs quickly turned his gaze to her face. Her black hair stuck to her neck and rosy cheeks. Her deep, jade eyes held him perfectly still.

The color in her eyes grew vibrant with conviction. "Gibbs, I swear on my worthless life I'm innocent," she vowed. "Believe me, Gibbs, you have to." She held the shower divider to support herself from a pending wave of tears.

Her silver-haired fox glanced at the floor and looked into her eyes again. Abby felt the subsequent goosebumps on the back of her neck. His blues had turned a shade bluer.

Gibbs wanted nothing else than to believe her, but her words upset him. He stepped forward; Abby's pale arm slipped back behind the wall.

"Abby – "

He held out his hand. He didn't know why he did – he wasn't exactly inviting her to expose herself, but he reached out to her nonetheless. He stared at her, hoping that she could see the heartbreaking effect of her own words. Gibbs couldn't believe she would think of herself that way.

"You're _not_ worthless."

Abby's lower lip quivered. "Oh Gibbs," she choked and shook her head in disbelief.

Gibbs smiled commiseratingly. He walked over and brought Abby a fresh towel. He turned around to let her wrap it on, but less than a heartbeat after he did, Abby leapt from his blindspot and hugged him.

"Gibbs," she sobbed. Her tears seeped into his shirt.

"Shh..." He kissed her forehead. "Here."

He wrapped his blazer around her and returned her embrace. Her damp skin was soft, and she fit like a glove in his arms. The steam settled about them like a fine fog at their feet.

"Gibbs," Abby spoke up after a long, peaceful moment, "you weren't there last night…"

Her boss looked at her and shook his head. He placed a finger over her lips again. "Tell me when we _do_ get there." Gibbs gently pulled away from her and patted her arm.

The main door of the shower room swung open. Abby held onto Gibbs, as he firmly held her arms and shifted into a protective stance.

Palmer stuck his head inside.

"Erm," he uttered, not exactly knowing what to do, now that he walked into an awkward moment. He looked between the forensic specialist and the special agent and laughed nervously. "I'm…I'm gonna go report back to Dr. Mallard now – excuse me."

Abby stared at the door before looking back at Gibbs, who wore his crooked grin.

"Damn Ducky," he chuckled.

* * *

**A/N:** I'm still not sure if I'm spacing out the paragraphs right; I always think one ENTER does the trick, but when I read over it, it's like I didn't try to double space it at all. I'll figure it out....eventually :P


	5. Chapter 5

**A/N:** Yay, a new chapter! With the NCIS-episode-guessing winners as guest stars! (You know who you are... ) This chapter was especially fun to write because of all the interesting dialogue, hehe. Not much to say, other than expressing my undying gratitude to all my readers! :_) Read on, my friends! (--Annie)

* * *

"Um, yes, Agent Anthony DiNozzo from NCIS speaking......oh. So you _did _receive our email about the black Chevy Neon, ma'am - er, Ms. Griffin - _Anita_. Okay then... Well, Anita." Tony looked up at Ziva with a wily grin on his face. "Find anything that..._stuck out_ to you?"

Ziva became distracted from her computer screen and instinctively grabbed her emergency paper clip from the edge of her desk. She kept Tony under her watchful eye while she continued her research.

McGee sat in his desk and stared at his screen pensively. He tapped his pen to a beat no one else heard and rested his chin on his palm. Nearly all the pictures from the crime scene were spread out across his desktop. He tried to piece his rendition of the events together...

_The seemingly innocent Abby Sciuto walks with Seaman Jason Knight after a romantic night on the town. The seaman is having trouble finding his car, and on their merry way they walk into an argument._

_Abby may have had one too many drinks...they fight, struggle. She doesn't know what she's doing._

_Filled with rage, she takes out the box-cutter from her purse - _

"No, no, no," McGee shakes his head furiously and mentally crumples the idea like a bad plot for his novel.

Neither Ducky nor the temporary replacement forensic specialist (chosen by Director Vance, much to Abby's dismay, McGee could imagine) had reported anything new yet. Ziva had returned five minutes ago from accompanying Gibbs' visit with the ME. Her silence spread to everyone else in the bullpen, but Tony-baloney always found some way to fill the empty airwaves. DiNozzo's antics aside, McGee knew he and everyone else was trying to cope with how their boss was dealing with this case.

The young agent peered at the plasma. Abby's database picture remained next to Seaman Knight's. He quickly looked away. As a friend, he knew working on this case would be difficult. It was obviously sending a rift through the team; earlier, he'd witnessed a Ziva-Tony battle come to a draw. McGee glanced over to the female agent's desk. She still held her paper clip in one hand while scrolling through a page on her computer with another.

The agent knew he was supposed to be helping his mossad partner with finding out anything else about Seaman Knight, through bank records, emails, the works - but something from the crime scene kept coming back to him. He cleared out the victim's recent monetary transactions and messages as clean and confirmed that the car was indeed his before he opened the photographs from that morning. He was drawn to one of Ziva's clicker-happy photographs; she'd shot as many pictures as she would shoot enemies with a machine gun. It was a picture of the backseat of the sedan. There was nothing special about it - fabric seats, crumbs and a few dust bunnies on the floor, and unused seatbelts – but McGee lingered on that photo the longest.

There were only so many possibilities as to what could happen in the backseat of a car.

McGee jammed the key to switch to the next picture.

"Ah ha ha, I promise you, where I'm going with this is absolutely pertinent to our case, Anita – Ms. Griffin? Ma'am – _miss?"_ Tony wore the most priceless face of defeat.

"Ha." Ziva twirled her paper clip in her fingers.

Tony puckered his brow. "_In all seriousness, miss_," he stuck his neck out at Ziva but continued speaking on the phone, "you did receive our email, as your business establishment is within the 10 to 20 block area we're focusing on, since our suspect black sedan couldn't have gone very far before crashing into half-oblivion. What is the name of your…" Tony's face lit up in pleasant surprise as he grabbed his pad and pen. "_Really_. I go there every other weekend. Ah – yes. _Yes_, that was me…" Tony dropped his pen. "That was _you_?" His jaw dropped this time. "That was your _best friend?_"

Ziva gripped her paper clip and could no longer concentrate. McGee stared.

The senior field agent straightened his collar and pointed at an imaginary person. "Let's forget that New Year's Eve party ever happened and get back to business. We are dealing with a dead Navy sailor – yes, a _real_ one, or we wouldn't be speaking, Ms. Griffin. Tell me what ya know, or I will take my business elsewhere." Tony drummed his fingers on his desk as he listened rather attentively.

Gibbs' desk phone suddenly rang.

All eyes rested on it.

The three exchanged glances before Ziva and Tony voted McGee off the island. Young Timothy unwillingly got up from his desk and checked the caller ID.

It was Abby's lab. McGee grabbed the receiver.

"Squad room," he answered.

"McGee."

The field agent gulped. "Boss?"

"_Never_ answer my phone," Gibbs said on the line.

McGee nodded. "I will remember that….Boss." _Why are you in Abby's lab?_

"And McGee."

"Yes, Boss?" the agent was back on his toes.

Gibbs paused. "Get back to work." He hung up.

McGee put the phone back in its cradle. His expression must have been another spectacle, since Ziva was analyzing him from her desk. It seemed that after working with Gibbs, one learned how to communicate without speaking a word.

"It was Gibbs," said McGee.

"And?" Ziva, still playing with her paper clip, sat at the edge of her chair.

McGee shrugged. "He was checking on us, I guess." He thought about his wild guess of Gibbs' intentions as he sat back down at his desk. "Surprised he didn't call Tony."

Ziva exhaled in amusement. "Gibbs' senior field agent is busy at the moment," she commented. Then she tilted her head meditatively and pursed her lips. "Hmm. I did not know there was a telephone in the showers."

McGee blinked. "There isn't."

Realizing her mistake, Ziva was back to her research, sans paper clip, before McGee could look at her with suspicion.

"What's this foolishness about phones and showers, Zee-vah?" Tony inquired once he finished his call. His notepad was full of shorthand notes that looked promising.

The woman wore a Cheshire smile and picked up her paper clip once more. "Oh," Ziva spoke casually, "nothing your sexually ornamented brain can't handle."

Tony squinted at her. "Oriented," he corrected.

"What difference does it make?" Ziva started undoing the thin metal wire.

"Gibbs was calling from Abby's lab," McGee broke in, annoyed. "Why would Gibbs be in the company _shower room_?"

Ziva's eyes briefly searched through her thoughts in front of her before the Cheshire grin returned. "Maybe they have moved on from the showers…" she speculated.

"_Th-They?_" McGee sputtered.

Tony's face dawned with realization. "No way," he gawked. He spun in his chair and pointed at his partner. "You thinkin' what I'm thinkin', McGeek?" he smiled.

McGee scrunched his face and set his fingers on his temples. "I'm not sure if I want to, Tony."

"Abby. Gibbs. Come on, McProbie-Pants."

McGee shut his eyes to block out the incoming disturbing images in his head.

"He's taking her interrogation to the _next level_," Tony slinked toward McGee suggestively. "When the stare doesn't work, Leroy Jethro Gibbs' hands do the talkin' – "

"Ah-_ha!_" Ziva held the paper-clip-turned-weapon at Tony. "I told you! I suggested _nothing!_" she guffawed. "Sexually. Ornamented."

"ORIENTED!" Tony smacked his desk. "God, Ziva, you make my brain sound like it's a kinky Christmas tree!!"

"Only because it's true..."

"That I would hang you by a hook, like an ornament, if I could?"

"_If_ you could, Tony?"

"Only a matter of _when_, Zee-vah."

"Are we forgetting who has the right hook here?" She held up her half-undone paper clip.

"Yes, I think we are…" Tony held up his fists.

_And Round 2 of David vs. DiNozzo has commenced…_ McGee sank lower and lower into his chair.

*** *** *** ***

Gibbs hung up Abby's phone and grinned, pleased. He had a feeling McGee would be the unfortunate soul that dared to venture to his desk and answer his phone. He trusted that his team was working hard on this case, but he had another feeling that there would be some head-slapping involved when he got back to the squad room.

A feminine laugh jingled from the main lab room. "Your McGee character doesn't sound like the sharpest tool."

Gibbs raised a brow. Picking up Abby's spare overnight bag (for those special cases that needed more of her special attention), he stepped out of the office portion of the lab to investigate.

A petite woman, maybe in her late-twenties or early-thirties, with a strawberry blonde pixie haircut and dangling earrings, walked over to one of the computers and started typing away. The choker around her neck reminded Gibbs of Abby's array of chokers and collars, but her overall attire seemed conservative compared to Abby's Gothic wear. She was actually wearing a light and airy dress under her white lab coat and ballerina-inspired slippers. Her features were very feline, down to her yellow eyes and rosy little nose. The woman looked even more catlike when she peered at the data on her computer and pursed her red lips.

"Replacement?" Gibbs asked. He wondered how he didn't notice her when he came in; it must have been her catlike stealth as well.

The woman stopped typing. He heard her giggle; her laugh resembled windchimes caught in a breeze. It was both pleasant and eerie to hear.

"Jamie Leigh," she introduced herself and held out her hand. Her hazel eyes widened, as did her smile, before he could reach her. "_The_ Leroy Jethro Gibbs?" she asked in awe. "The Director told me all about you."

"Special Agent Gibbs," he half-smiled and shook her dainty hand. "Did he now?"

Jamie just chimed melodically. She returned to her computer work. "It will be a pleasure working with you, sir."

Gibbs nodded and started to leave. A flash of red in the corner of his eye made him turn right back around. The agent saw Abby's tainted shirt spread out on the evidence table.

"Anything I should know about, Ms. Leigh?" Gibbs brusquely questioned.

Jamie spun around and looked at Gibbs alertly. "It's Jamie, sir," she answered, "and….yes and no." She tilted her head side to side, truly unsure.

Gibbs stared at her.

Jamie's happy-go-lucky façade wavered a tad under Gibbs' powerful gaze. She looked at the shirt on the table then back at him. "If that's what you're wondering about – " She absentmindedly reached for something behind her while pointing at Abby's shirt. Her hand produced a black baseball cap, and she placed it snuggly on her head.

The white letters on her hat distracted Gibbs briefly. _S – T – L – F – A – N?_ he thought. There was also a red feather perched on top of the letters that was part of the whole embroidered design.

The new forensic specialist paused, her cat eyes catching his curious ones. She simpered, "It's my thinking cap. My boyfriend's a Cardinals fan – once a cardinal, always a cardinal, y'know?" She chimed again.

"Uh huh." Now that that was demystified, Gibbs continued to look at her expectantly, but he knew how it would come off on her.

Jamie immediately stopped giggling and continued where she left. "I, um, ran a test for human blood, and the blood on the shirt is indeed human." She hesitated. "But I'm running another test to see if it's either Scuito's or – "

_Beep-beep-beep!_

A printer sitting next to one of Abby's machines spewed out a piece of paper. Jamie leapt to it and brought the paper over to another computer. Gibbs watched as her fingers dance across the keyboard. Her hand reached for the mouse and clicked it, only to have her face pale in fright. Jamie stepped away and kept looking back and forth between the paper and the computer.

"Y'know," she finally spoke, "I haven't met your Abby Scuito, she seems real snazzy and all, but – " Her voice broke.

Gibbs' brow furrowed. He dropped Abby's bag and strode toward the strawberry blonde. He never fully understood how his presence made people around him buckle to their knees, but the agent used that to his advantage whenever the opportunity arose. Standing but a foot away from Ms. Leigh, Gibbs watched her turn from a cat to a mouse.

"Spit it out, Leigh," he hissed.

"You _kinda_ have to wonder how a man's blood gets on a girl like her," she squeaked.

Seaman Knight's picture appeared next to a window containing his blood type.

Gibbs leaned closer to her, "_Ya think?_"

Jamie winced.

"Have a better picture for me when I get back. Ms. Leigh."

The new forensic specialist squinted into space, befuddled, before saluting quickly, "Yes, sir."

Gibbs shook his head and headed out. It was only one piece of evidence – the one piece of the puzzle he thought would make a picture of Abby's innocence. There was still hope in his team's diligent investigative skills and Ducky's insight. He would have to rely on those things in reverse order, as Gibbs had trusted Abby to return to the morgue and wait for him patiently, when he promised to retrieve her spare set of clothes (she was just about to rip up another perfectly good body suit). Being a "key witness" (as he refused to see her as a killer, despite his visit with Ms. Leigh), Abby was technically still under NCIS's custody. And with the position she was in now, Gibbs couldn't see her trying to escape against his wishes.

He entered Ducky's domain a little too confidently.

The room was void of life. Seaman Knight remained lying on the table. Not a set of scrubs or a body suit in sight.

Gibbs flung Abby's bag onto the same table that held the bloody evidence earlier and searched the room. He was looking under all the tables in the room when the sliding double doors opened and let the ME inside.

Ducky ambled in, rambling about a past lover with a vendetta, when he stopped in his tracks and exclaimed, "I say, Gibbs, the last time I had to scour the undersides of the tables was when Palmer's friends paid a visit and then lost 'a little something,' as they so described and giggled for no good reason."

"Where were you?" Gibbs snapped.

Ducky was taken aback somewhat. "I had to use the facilities. Mr. Palmer and I were virtually done with your dead seaman, when I had to…" He eyes wandered around the room. "Where is Mr. Palmer anyhow?"

"Where's _Abby_?"

"Abigail? I thought she was still in the showers with you…"

Gibbs glared at him at first, but then both men looked at each other with the same perplexed expression.

"I found those blindfolds you wanted – Dr. Mallard!?"

Jimmy Palmer, holding a pair of cheetah–printed sleeping masks, entered the room from the giant closet door next to Ducky's desk.

Ducky wagged his finger at his medical assistant and approached him. "Mr. Palmer, how could you have not told me that you at least saw Abby?"

Palmer stammered, "But, Doctor, I –"

"And what, pray tell, were you two secretly planning on doing with those _blindfolds_?"

Palmer held up his hands in surrender. "I – I – they were her idea, Doctor, let me explain!"

Gibbs took a step toward Palmer, while the young man took a step back.

"Oh, no, please, Agent Gibbs, we weren't – " Palmer choked. " – at least, I think we weren't going to – I don't know what she had in mind, sir, I just – "

"_Talk,_" Gibbs said plainly.

"You're awfully close to my face, Agent Gibbs."

"I'll get closer if you don't start talking, Palmer."

_Clunk–clunk–clunk!_

Gibbs', Ducky's, and Palmer's heads all looked in different directions. The clunking, knocking sound came from somewhere in the room. It sounded like someone knocking on one of the examination tables, but Seaman Knight was the only occupant of any of the tables. They all heard the clunking sound again; Palmer started tip–toeing away from Gibbs in search of the source of the sound.

"We're not done, Palmer," Gibbs grabbed his scrubs' sleeve.

"I might know where Abby is, Agent Gibbs," Palmer said rather calmly. "405…305…?"

"What do those numbers mean?" Gibbs let go of Palmer and turned to Ducky.

Ducky just looked at his assistant, thus making Gibbs try to see what Ducky was trying to read from Palmer's actions. The young man was stepping cautiously closer and closer to the wall where they temporarily stored the dead…

"Maybe 203?" Palmer rubbed his chin.

_CLUNK! Clunk! Clunk!_

"This would be _so _much easier and a lot less smellier if I had my phone, Gibbs," a muffled voice called.

All three raced to the same wall, with Gibbs and Ducky mostly following Palmer. Gibbs made a note to choose his method of disciplining Palmer later, seeing as one head-slap didn't seem to suffice. At the same time, though, he felt like smacking himself upside the head for leaving Abby alone.

They all stood inches from the wall of doors, with Palmer leading the way, followed by Gibbs and then Ducky.

"Why on earth would Abby want to hide in one of _these_?" Ducky pondered.

"Gibbs, if you can hear me, don't hurt Palmer, it's not his fault."

The agent moved a smiling Palmer aside and started knocking on door 203.

"Uh, two to your…left, and one down."

Gibbs sighed. Hiding in the very bottom corner drawer of a morgue seemed very much like Abby. Ignoring her fascination with death, he never wanted to see Abby lying in one of these drawers. Without hesitation, he opened door 101 and pulled out the silver bed his lab rat lay upon.

Abby lay on her back, her long black hair a little wavier from air-drying. She kept her eyes shut and her hands folded against her chest, as if she were awaiting punishment or silently begging to stop it. Without her makeup, she did look dead, much to Gibbs' chagrin; and the wincing expression only added lines to her face that he wanted to erase.

"Abigail, are you in such a hurry to _die_ that you had to bury yourself in my morgue?" Ducky, completely flabbergasted, dropped the question on her.

Abby opened one of her eyes. "No," she laughed, but her laughter disappeared when she rested her eye on Gibbs. Both of her eyes opened. "I…I just couldn't look at Jas – the body, Gibbs," her tone as well as her face turned grave. "So I was hiding behind the doorframe over there." She pointed accordingly. "And Jimmy saw me, but I told him to shut up. Once Ducky left, I came in but kept Jimmy quiet. I kept telling him to cover Jas – the body, or fetch me some blindfolds so I wouldn't have to see it. When _he_ was gone, I had nothing else to look at except Jas – the _damn_ body. And I didn't know what to do with myself because for all I know maybe you _are_ right and I killed him – I didn't leave, but I didn't want to stand over him anymore so I – "

"Hid yourself among other dead people?" Gibbs finished and gestured the rest of the drawers. "Because that makes so much sense."

Abby tilted her head and failed at concealing her hurt expression. "In a way…" She looked down and muttered bitterly under her breath, "I wish I was dead right about now."

Gibbs moved in so that they were almost nose to nose. "What did just you say, Abbs?" It was a silly question, he knew, and surely she knew that, too.

Abby peered at him through squinted eyes. "Nothing," she retorted. Her hot breath blew in his face. It was an even sillier answer.

"I'm digging you up then."

He took Abby's hand and pulled her up from her death bed. Ducky and Palmer silently made way for Gibbs and Abby. He kept his hand firmly around hers and led her to the double doors. Abby yanked his arm when they passed up her bag neatly thrown aside on one of the tables. She hurried to pick it up herself before Gibbs returned the favor and pulled her to the doors.

"Why are they holding hands, Dr. Mallard?" Palmer inquired quietly.

Ducky sighed and waved his question away with his hand while he walked back to Seaman Knight. "Why are you whispering, Palmer, it's not a secret."

Outside the morgue, Gibbs punched the elevator button and dropped Abby's hand. A mist of disappointment showered over Abby, wishing he could've held her hand maybe a second longer. They didn't speak until they stepped inside the elevator car. Abby already saw what was coming.

Gibbs pressed an upper button and waited for the doors to close. Then after a few good seconds, her boss switched the emergency stop. Abby stumbled a bit and lost her balance from the abrupt stop, but Gibbs caught her arm before she could do any more damage to her head. Abby surprised herself when she shook his hand away.

Abby gasped.

"_What are you doing – stop it!"_

"_You lying son of a bitch!"_

"_Abby! Abby!!!"_

"_To hell with both of you!"_

"_ABBY NOOO!"_

"Abbs!" Gibbs shouted. He gently shook her shoulders.

Abby shook her head, shaking out of her reverie, shaking everywhere. She held onto Gibbs for support for a moment, then stepped away from him. Abby hugged herself and winced. The snippet of a memory faded away, but the feeling remained so clear. She held her head in her hands.

"What the hell happened to me?" she whispered.

"Abby. Listen to me." Gibbs turned her around and kept his hands on her tense shoulders. "I want you to _stay_ and wait for me in the interrogation room. One of the team is going to be there to watch you."

Abby looked up at Gibbs incredulously. "I'm not a child, Gibbs, and I can't believe you. Jason's killer could still be out there, and you're worried about _me_ of all people?" She'd given up on trying not to say his name.

"The blood on your shirt was Seaman Knight's," Gibbs said.

The words hit Abby like a slap in the face. They stung and paralyzed her, and she couldn't say anything for a minute. Gibbs could see her eyes darting and searching for an answer. He didn't know what else to do other than to watch and hold her. But even then, Abby eventually slipped away from him, walked over to the back corner of the car, and sat down.

"Abby," Gibbs stepped toward her.

Abby hid her face behind her hair. She hugged her knees. "I should've stayed in that stupid car," she mumbled.

He stopped.

The last thing he wanted to hear was his cell phone ringing; the annoying piece of technology rang and filled the silence. Gibbs turned away from Abby and answered it.

"Gibbs."

"Boss?"

The agent heaved a sigh. "McGee, this better be damn important."

His field agent relayed the information Tony was able to get from his mysterious caller and everything McGee and Ziva had gathered. "But, really, Boss, that's not the important part."

Gibbs made a face. "Then what is it, McGee?"

"I'm calling from the men's bathroom."

"That's nice to know."

"Uh, no, Boss, you don't understand – "

"_Make_ me, McGee."

"Tony and Ziva have turned the bullpen into a ring – it's getting pretty ugly."

* * *

**A/N:** This actually turned out alot longer than I expected. Despite it's length, I always find myself stuck in the quicksands of writer's block :X Oh, and do y'all want me to ask another question to win another possible spot in an NCIS fic? Yay, nay? Reviews are love, lol!


	6. Chapter 6

"DiNozzo."

_Smack!_

"David…"

_Smack!_

"And McGee."

"Boss, I didn't do any – "

_Smack!_

Gibbs looked McGee straight in the eye. "Exactly."

He turned to all three of them, his field agents all standing in a line at attention. Tony was still rubbing the back of his head; Ziva was the ever stoic mossad. McGee still kept his attention on him, but the young man's eyes showed he was still a little stunned. _He should be_, Gibbs thought, amusement tickling his lips, but he fought it back. This was no laughing matter – no time for attempted murder with office supplies or fists, when a real murder had already taken place and hit close to home.

"If I catch _any_ of you instigating another round in this squad room," Gibbs glowered and paced in front of them, "I will personally send you to the Director for a _real_ bout."

McGee gulped. Ziva stared ahead. Tony grimaced.

Gibbs smothered his face with his hand to hide the draining sigh that passed through his lips. The weight of this whole case was beginning to wear on him. He thought he could rely on his team to at least be mature, especially since one of their own was more than entangled in the details of this case. In spite of the inconsiderate vibes he'd been giving off earlier, Gibbs was just as concerned about Abby's outcome as anyone else in the team was – maybe even a little more.

He could still feel the ghost of her warm, scarlet body, completely helpless and vulnerable. The dying glimmer in her eyes as she passed out in his arms. It was starting to cloud his better judgment.

He needed his team. To clear the fog. To clear Abby's name.

"Ziva," he said more soberly. "Interrogation observation."

Tony glanced to his left and saw the thin line formed by Ziva's brow, but she nodded silently to Gibbs' order.

"McGee. Report to the lab – keep an eye on our replacement specialist. She's gonna need the help."

McGee perked up when Gibbs said _she_. "Will do, Boss." The cyber agent eagerly left the discipline line.

"DiNozzo, you're coming with me. Let's pay this 'establishment' of yours a visit."

"It's not really mine, Boss, it's – "

Gibbs looked at him.

"… Gearing up, Boss."

Gibbs watched Tony walk to his desk and gather his things. The only one left and not doing her job stood before Gibbs and looked at him intently. The special agent walked up to her with the same intensity in his eyes. Gibbs saw the line between her brows deepen, but the rest of her face was relatively composed.

"Now, Ziva," Gibbs said after they had stared at each other.

Her eyes became cold. "Abby is not a criminal." With that, Ziva silently turned to leave. Her hair grazed Gibbs' face.

As Tony swung his backpack over his shoulder, he saw Ziva walk away from the bullpen, and he immediately wanted to shiver. He kept staring at the way she silently stormed off in the most sophisticated way. One of her hands reached for her opposite arm, as if she had hurt herself, and she soon disappeared into the shadows of the back corridor leading to the interrogation room. Tony covered his mouth in thought.

He was lucky enough to get one more glance at his boss's face before they departed for the establishment. Gibbs shared the line Ziva held between her brows; but along with the other lines etched into his boss's face through age, Gibbs' stare became even more intimidating. Tony kept his eyes transfixed on Gibbs while his hands picked up his notes and a piece of paper from his printer.

"Here's the address, Gibbs," Tony said.

His boss looked at him and snatched the paper from him without a word.

Tony waited till he could only see the back of Gibbs' head before deflating like a balloon. He took a last look at the dark hallway - where in its twists and corners, Abby was waiting.

*** *** *** ***

Abby took a good, long, hard look at herself; she was the only person she could look at, at the moment. The other Abby that looked back at her was exhausted and slouched her shoulders. Her green eyes were dull puddles in her head. She tried to ignore the hideous bandage on her nose that reminded her of the nose strips football players sometimes wore. Her hair was borderline frizzy a while ago, but she fixed her hair into two braids on either side of her pallid cheeks. Her arms felt oddly naked without armwarmers or jewelry, even with the tattoos she had. She wore a black t-shirt with a red broken heart sewn on the fabric, which made Abby chuckle bitterly.

At some point, maybe half an hour in, Abby couldn't look at herself anymore. She gave the other Abby a one-finger-salute and brandished the small smiley face inked on her saluting finger. Abby rose from the wooden, but metallic, chair and crossed her arms. She looked at her own plaid pajama pants and flip-flops she wore and wiggled her toes. It also felt odd not wearing her boots. The extra inches added to her height gave her a sort of confidence that she deeply wished she had now.

Abby suddenly entered a sneezing fit – once, twice, maybe four sneezes in a row. The superstitious side of her brain told her either someone mentioned her name or someone was thinking of her. A lot. Her thoughts became hopeful, as to who was thinking of her, but only for a fleeting second.

Some time later, she began to feel the ever growing presence of the small camera in the corner of the room. Abby remembered she was being watched. She looked at her reflection in the one-way window; someone other than the dirty old bastard was there. Abby gasped, realizing that her very special salute was probably unintentionally given to someone else.

"Hey," she spoke for the time in the room. The room had horrible acoustics, and she could practically see the sound waves crash and die at the corners of the ceiling. "Sorry if I flicked you off earlier. That wasn't meant for you. Seriously. Tony. McGee. Or Ziva."

No response.

"If y'all even saw that..." She made a face and turned away from the window.

Abby slowly lost track of time. She almost lost her mind, too. She kept her mind and herself awake by lying on the table and occasionally looking at the light bulbs above her. She slipped off her flip-flops and lay on the table in different positions, as if she were lying in bed. She finally curled into a ball and embraced herself; she kept one of her hands on the threads of her broken heart. Abby tried to close her eyes, but she knew what she'd see if she did. She didn't want to recall anything, and yet she wanted to. She made the battling sides of her brain happy by postponing her memory searching for when the dirty old bastard came back.

_Dammit! I don't want to think about _you_ either!_

Abby rolled over and pouted. Seconds later, her head ached. There wasn't much to do other than to take one of the routes that the fork in her stream of consciousness created. Both paths were unpleasant, and standing at the end of each of them was a man she wished she hadn't known.

She met Jason Knight at the bowling alley she frequented. He was a player on the opposing team during one of the game nights at the alley. Jason had a boyish charm to him – a charm that caught Abby off guard. He had gone before her and impressed her with a single, swift strike. Abby was simply fascinated with the fact that a wiry guy with thick-rimmed glasses could play with such precision and power. She remembered the pins clashing and falling down, and Jason spinning in a victorious circle and instantly catching her eye. After an awkward second, Jason adjusted his glasses with his thumb and smiled at Abby.

Abby never knew that Jason was in the Navy. He never mentioned it. Now she understood why their dates were so spread out, why his phone calls and emails were more prolific than his visits, and maybe why he was so reserved. There was a period when he never called her at all; she wasn't all that upset, but it did bother her. That's when she started seeing other men, in the bowling alley, at clubs, at concerts, wherever she might bump into them. But she always went back to Jason whenever he was "back." He'd always say he was busy or was out of town, both of which were true, she guessed. Looking back now, Abby felt betrayed; she wondered why he would leave out such a huge part of his life from her....

"_I'm not going anywhere. I can finally be here for you, Abby."_

"_Really?" She beamed._

_His lips met hers in a gentle kiss. His hand spun her around..._

Abby squinted and willed her brain to try to retain this unexpected fragment. Her mind just started playing it...

_...and they danced. The bass from the speakers replaced her own beating heart. His hands were all around her. His breath on her skin made her smile._

The memory was euphoric, but Abby felt strangely saddened by it.

_She gave him a huge kiss on the cheek; she laughed when she saw that she made her mark on him._

Abby touched her faintly maroon lips.

_They left the flooded dance floor in a hurry. Where they were going, she didn't know..._

...but the film cut to piece of the movie she'd already seen. The bloody, gruesome part of the horror romance she actually didn't want to see again. She thought she had forgotten it.

_Pain. All too much to bear. It hurt – kept hurting and hurting and hurting and hurting._

"_What are you doing – stop it!" Jason ghosted into the yellow light._

"_You lying son of a bitch!"_

"_Abby! Abby!!!" Jason called out._

"_To hell with both of you!"_

_Blood - everywhere._

"_ABBY NOOO!"_

_A knife was in her hands, bloodstained and warm._

_The knife fell from her paralyzed fingers and clattered on the concrete ground._

_Someone pulled her – _

"Abby."

Abby blinked profusely. She sat up; she wanted to punch the wall. She thought she was empty of tears. No wonder her vision was blurry. She quickly wiped away the salty water from her eyes and turned around, still sitting on the table. The girl was looking at herself again, but she could have sworn she heard a voice speaking to her. She got off the table and walked up to the one-way window. Abby knocked on the glass and pressed her hands on it.

"I hope you're happy, Gibbs," Abby snarled.

No response.

Abby shook her head and folded her arms. She walked back to her seat and rested her chin on the heels of her palms.

On the other side of the glass, the button for the intercom was still pushed down.

Ziva didn't know what she was doing. She released the intercom speaker and folded her arms.

She'd been watching Abby for what felt like forever. Watching her was interesting at first, as Ziva witnessed all of her different idiosyncrasies. Ziva, however, thought it a waste of her time and skills to be stuck watching a harmless girl wait around to be interrogated. Abby's involvement was still shrouded in mystery, so Ziva admitted to seeing the reasoning behind keeping her under surveillance. But from the pictures she'd taken, Ziva could see that Abby was sitting next to the victim when he died. It didn't make sense for the murderer to be in the same death trap with her victim.

Abby had distracted her from her thoughts sometimes. She saw Abby suddenly raise a finger at her, but Ziva couldn't help smiling to herself when she heard Abby apologizing later. Some of the ways she had twisted herself onto the table made Ziva stare. The last time Abby caught her full attention was when Ziva heard her crying. Ziva couldn't see Abby's face; she didn't need to. That's when she pressed the intercom button.

Ziva's hand reached for the switch. A feeling she rarely felt made her fingers linger on the button, so she didn't know why she couldn't press it again.

*** *** *** ***

Gibbs parked the car and checked the paper once more.

Tony craned his neck and looked out Gibbs' window. "Yeee-up, this is it. I didn't know Abby partied here. She has great taste. For a Goth."

Gibbs squinted at the building. "There's apparently a lot we don't know about her, DiNozzo." He opened his own door. "That's why we're here."

Tony sat in his seat thinking. _Gibbs is actually talking... I shouldn't be happy. _

Their car ride was deafeningly silent. The tension Ziva had cast on Gibbs spread throughout the car interior like a poisonous cloud. Tony got out before Gibbs could say anything about it, silently or verbally. He found his boss standing right outside the car, almost leaning against it. He didn't know if Gibbs was being unusually nice and was waiting for him or not.

_Gibbs _isn't_ talking… I shouldn't be happy._

Plush 9 – this was the meeting place for Abby and her "friend" Jason. An outwardly innocuous building, this was the swanky club where McGee said the car was seen last. Gibbs then recalled everything the young agent told him on the phone and folded his arms, still looking at the camouflaged club building on the strip.

The "business establishment" was technically just outside their search area. A friend of Ms. Anita Griffin's, who owned a café within their range, forwarded their email to her. Ms. Griffin called NCIS soon after receiving the message; she recalled the vehicle – more so the happy couple entering and leaving in it than the actual car. As hostess/manager, she could see all who came and went. They were, in her words, "leaving Plush 9 and jumping aboard Cloud 9."

Gibbs tightened his arms. He could see it now – Abby glowing and holding hands with someone that made her truly happy. In the face of her happiness, Gibbs saw himself watching her behind an invisible glass wall.

"Plush 9 – also known as _Lush_ 9," Tony commented out of nowhere, "but you didn't hear that from me..."

Gibbs blinked and stared at Tony from the corner of his eye. "Hear what, DiNozzo."

They entered the club, Gibbs leading the way. Tony stayed a step behind; his eyes however, were strides ahead and perused the daytime customers that were there. Oh, the place was like a playground to DiNozzo - at night anyway. The swanky club felt more like a chill restaurant during the day than a party place. Soft, pop-ish music with a sensual beat played in the background, from the various speakers planted throughout the high-ceiling room; and lights behind the array wall fixtures and greenery changed colors every thirty seconds or so. The whole place gave off an overall exotic vibe to Tony, especially with the selection of customers present for the afternoon. Tony caught the eye of a woman sitting with her friends at a booth near the back of the room. She wore elevator eyes and tapped her lips with her finger. Tony grinned and smoothly took off his shades. He almost walked into one of the standing columns that separated the bar from the tables. All the women at the booth burst into laughter.

Gibbs glanced at DiNozzo and immediately knew his senior agent was clearly surveying another part of the club entirely. The special agent was more concerned with finding this Anita Griffin from whom Tony received his call. If she was such an observant hostess, her absence came as a surprise. They passed a lounging area, where a large spiral staircase stood in the corner and led to the second floor. His eyes swept over the bar, with its endless collection bottles behind the counter. Gibbs decided to sit at the bar; he leaned over and saw someone coming from the back. Tony got himself together and sat next to Gibbs as the mystery someone came out.

"Good afternoon, gentlemen," the entering bartender greeted. He was drying a wine glass with a towel. "What can I get ya guys?"

Tony clenched his fist under the counter. Here was the reason why there were more female guests in the afternoon than Tony remembered. The bartender's black shirt snuggly hugged his firm set of abs. He pushed up his sleeves, when he set the wine glass down and slung the towel over his shoulder, and revealed toned, muscular arms that made Tony stare. His brown eyes were accented by his thick, yet sculpted eyebrows – all of which was balanced by the most chiseled square jaw line Tony had ever seen. His hair was a whole other work of art – perfectly styled brunette tidal waves crashing into each other in one, hot mess of a hairdo. Tony thought he would suffer from sensory overload.

Gibbs stamped on Tony's shoe. "NCIS," the special agent replied, unphased by the bartender. The two of them showed their badges – Tony, again, a beat behind. "Agents Gibbs and DiNozzo. We're looking for Anita Griffin, she called us earlier regarding our current case."

The bartender paused to think. He picked up the wine glass and tossed it between his hands without looking at it. "You mean Norah?" he said after a moment.

"Norah?" Gibbs and Tony asked in unison.

"We platonic people call her Norah." He spun the glass around its stem with his fingers and finally put it back in its place. "That's her 'business' name, Norah – it's also her middle name." He leaned on the counter and grinned deviously at them. "Do one of you know her personally?"

Gibbs gave the bartender a look, then Tony a look, who raised a brow and stared at the bartender some more.

"Anita Norah Griffin?" Tony enunciated.

"Anthony D. DiNozzo - to save you the embarrassment."

All three men looked in the voice's direction.

Ms. Griffin wore stilettos that clacked down the stairs. Her pinstriped pantsuit was tailored well to her hourglass figure; and her sandy, medium length hair complemented her blue eyes and red-orange lipstick. The way her bangs were so cleanly cut added to her "professional" look, but Gibbs could still subtract a few years from her appearance. She was young - for managing a club that she could just as well enjoy herself as the majority of her customers do. She came down the stairs, a phantom smile on her lips, and walked right up to Tony and Gibbs at the bar.

"Mr. DiNozzo," she held out her hand.

"Why, you're too kind, Ms. Griffin," Tony feigned gratitude and shook her hand.

The hostess squeezed his hand with an iron grip. Pretending she couldn't hear Tony's soft yelps, she turned to the other agent and said, "I don't believe we've met."

Gibbs looked her in the eye. "Ms. Norah, you called saying you have more information regarding the last night Seaman Jason Knight was alive..." He paused briefly and fleetingly glanced at Tony. "Ignore my partner."

Tony yelped in what sounded like agreement. Ms. Griffin immediately let go of Tony's red hand. "Gladly." She looked at him. "Forgive me for being rude - agent...?"

"Gibbs." He shook her hand.

"Agent Gibbs – call me whatever, I don't care anymore." She started clacking toward the lounge; she sounded more her age when she finally spoke to him. "Take a seat and I'll tell you the rest."

Gibbs smiled for the first time in what felt like a while. He quickly smacked Tony in the back of the head and followed the hostess into the lounge square, leaving Tony with the incredible bartender.

"That was _very_ interesting," the man commented.

Tony puckered his brow. "Shouldn't you be juggling Smirnoff bottles or something?"

Gibbs followed the hostess to one of the modern couches by the spiral staircase. He got a better look at her once they were situated. His best guess at her age was her around mid-twenties. Ms. Griffin crossed her legs and adjusted her hair at least five times before tucking it all behind her ears.

"Something wrong, Ms. Norah?"

The hostess looked up at him. "No, sir." She sat back, a little more relaxed, and folded her arms. "I first saw the car outside at about eight o'clock. His date got out of the front seat – cute girl, bubbly…Gothic, but still cute."

Gibbs covered his grin.

"He drove off to find a parking spot, and I said hi to his date. Ten or fifteen minutes later, maybe, he came in – tall, lanky…almost called him Peter Parker, he was a charm. I pointed him to his table with his date."

"Did they drink?"

Her blue eyes became slit. "I suppose they did, Agent Gibbs, this is a club."

She reached to tuck a stray lock of hair behind her ear, but Gibbs grabbed her wrist. "Hey. Don't be a smartass with me."

Ms. Griffin glared at him. "You'll have to ask Sheldon about that." She pointed at the bar, looking at her lap, her head quivering. "Agent Gibbs, please let go of my wrist, you're hurting me."

Gibbs did so and saw the elegant, intricate watch that hugged her pink wrist. He suspiciously looked back at her. "What are you doing here?" he questioned.

The sandy blonde threw a questioning look back at him, until his question finally came to her. A troubled look swept over her eyes, and she leaned in toward Gibbs, uncrossing both her legs and arms. "Look," she lowered her voice, "I inherited this 'establishment' – " She drew bunny-ear quotes around the word. " – and worked my butt off since I graduated to get this place to where it is. This used to be a dying café my grandmother owned – now look at it. The last thing I want is for all my hard work to go down the toilet because of something _I_ didn't do." She went a few steps ahead of Gibbs and quickly added. "I was standing at that counter by the door for most of the night, Sheldon and anyone else here can testify, and I only left to use the bathroom or get a bottle of water."

Gibbs looked away from Anita N. Griffin; the look in her eyes was reminiscent of another pair of eyes he'd seen that day. "We're not yet sure if Seaman Knight died in your club, Anita," he switched to her "personal" name, to which she became alert. Gibbs went on. "I didn't say we suspected you of anything. _You_ said you had information that could help us."

"I'll do whatever else I can to help, Agent Gibbs – I'll even go upstairs when we're done to give you the security tapes from last night."

Gibbs held back a smile. "Tony can fetch them for you. Now, you said they left – "

"At around midnight, with the whole 'Plush 9 to Cloud 9' thing – I really meant that." Ms. Griffin genuinely smiled and sighed happily. "But, now that you mention it, the Goth girl may have had a few more drinks than Peter Parker."

Gibbs stare-glared. "Describe."

"Sh-She seemed a little more loosened up than the guy was. He was holding her hand and leading her out the door. I mean, they were both high on ecstasy – figuratively, Agent Gibbs, chill – but the girl... They turned and walked southward on the sidewalk outside." She peered over the couch and looked out the glass panels in the front of the club. "Out the door and to the left. The girl tripped over her boots once. They both laughed – then they walked away."

_Riiiiing!!!_ Gibbs grabbed his phone. "Tell my partner where to go, Ms. Anita." He got up from the couch and walked over to the alcove of the spiral staircase. "Gibbs."

"You know, Jethro, when I said we were virtually done with Seaman Knight, I thought you would at least _virtually_ return to the morgue."

"Ducky." A thought occurred to Gibbs. "Did tox come back in yet?"

The ME paused for a moment or two before answering his abrupt question. "Your seaman was clean and sober when he died," Ducky said, "as was Abby. Jamie came in a few minutes ago with the results. Where are you, anyhow?"

Gibbs hung up. He saw Ms. Anita tap Tony on the shoulder, who was in the middle of questioning Sheldon, the bartender he'd been ogling earlier.

A few minutes later, after Gibbs watched Tony and Ms. Griffin climbed up the steps - _Riiiiing!!!_

"Yeah, Gibbs."

"Boss, come down to the lab whenever you can," McGee said. "Jamie and I have been working together on the evidence..."

Gibbs squinted at his agent's lingering tone. "And?"

He heard shuffling sounds in the background. McGee lowered his voice. "I'm as happy as you are, Boss."

Gibbs clasped his phone at once. And almost instantly following that –

_Riiiiing!!!_

"_What_?" Gibbs answered.

"How long must I watch over an innocent girl, Gibbs?"

The agent tensed and turned back to the alcove with his phone. "You think you have all of this figured out? Huh, Ziva?" he asked through gritted teeth.

"No..." Ziva answered as calmly as she could. "I thought _you_ did."

* * *

**A/N:** This is probably the last update for a while. School's starting soon for me - this week actually, so I've been busy preparing for that... BUT - I will also give you one more chance before I dive back into academia. On request, I'm giving another chance for a lucky person to have a "walk-on" role (I'm throwing out that CI episode guess, no one got it :P) So here's the trivia question, it should be a bit easier...

_In what 1987 movie did Mark Harmon (aka Gibbs) play a gym teacher forced to teach remedial English to keep his job?_

That's all for now. Thank you everyone as always for reading, faving and watching :) (~Annie out.)


	7. Chapter 7

**A/N:** FINALLY! What a better time to update than on the Labor Day weekend? I can never thank you all enough for your patience and interest. The first two winners from the last question are **Hawkeye4077** and **purpledragonfly74**!!! Though, I feel like that question was way too easy, so I think I'll ask another question at the end of this chapter--so get those Google and Wikipedia tabs ready! And thank you especially to the friends I recently made--you know who you are ;) SO, the next chapter will have potentially _four _guests/walk-on roles. I've delayed the guest-ing again, but for a good reason. I mostly worked on this while being sick with the recent flu virus that's been going around :( On top of school, it's been challenging to update, but I've finally got this installment done at least! The next coming chapter(s) makes way for a number of "guest" opportunities. Anyway, here's the long-awaited Chapter 7... (~Annie)

* * *

McGee winced. His frozen hand still held the phone by his ear. He knew all too well by now the deafening power of silence. McGee checked his phone, and sure enough his boss had left their brief conversation on an uncertain note. Either the call was dropped, or Gibbs didn't need to listen to more. Or want to listen. The latter sounded more like his elusive boss.

"So? What'd he say?"

Tim McGee spun around to the melodic voice, and slid his phone in his pocket. Jamie held a strange, entrancing quality about her. Yes, she was pretty, but she held a _je ne sais quoi_ that had McGee's attention. He realized she was waiting expectantly for a peep from him, and so he opened and closed his mouth and stuttered for an answer, like he normally would. "I, um, Gibbs, he, uh—"

"He's not a happy camper, is he?" Jamie tilted her head and smiled wryly.

"Not at all," the agent was able to say.

Jamie shrugged and frowned. "Had a hunch."

McGee walked over to Jamie and stood next to her in front of the evidence table. Her choker and earrings sparkled from her own skin's glow, it seemed.

"Shall we, Agent McGee?" Jamie playfully socked his arm.

The young agent was even more fascinated by the replacement. His mouth stayed open for a few seconds before testing the waters. "Now I know who you remind me of…"

Jamie raised a brow, but she smiled again and wrinkled her fairy nose. "Who could that be?" she asked.

McGee thought. "On second thought, I'm not...really sure." He paused, then said it anyway. "If you have a sudden urge to hug me at some point after this, then I'll know for sure."

Jamie's laugh rang pleasantly in his ears. "Does it have to be a hug…?"

McGee's head snapped up. "Uh…"

Jamie shrugged again. "Whatever. I want to make sure we've got a better picture before he gets here – Special Agent Gibbs…" She shuddered at the name and couldn't finish.

"Right," McGee understood.

"Right," Jamie smiled back at him.

The two of them gazed over the table of evidence. McGee adjusted his suddenly tight collar. All the bloodied clothes were put away in their bags and boxes. He watched Jamie pick up the bag of the box-cutter knife in her gloved hands; she had gathered enough samples from it earlier. "The weapon of choice – the hardware store box-cutter knife," Jamie said in awe. She held it above her head so she could look up at it. "I could only find Sciuto's prints on them…" She looked at McGee, an empathetic twinkle showing in her eyes. "But…in my educated opinion, I guess, some of the surface on the plastic handle suggests it might have been wiped a bit before Ms. Sciuto gripped it. Might. It's a bit of a stretch."

McGee had to shift his eyes away and put them on something else. Either everyone, even the new forensic specialist, took a silent communication course from Professor Gibbs, or McGee's face was a children's picture book. He needed to fix that.

"Interestingly..." Jamie continued her inventory check. She pulled over one of the boxes and took out the deadweight that drove Abby and the seaman halfway to death. "Ms. Sciuto touched this too." She opened the toolbox and squinted inside. "But we will give this address on the box to Agent Gibbs once he gets here."

"Yes…" The agent glanced over his shoulder to see an empty doorframe. "Yes, yes we will," he said more confidently.

"Hmm. That address does look familiar though," Jamie commented. "Though I think I've seen the addresses to a million warehouses since I started working in metro forensics, so I dunno."

McGee chuckled.

Jamie twirled around to the computers and pulled up some of the pictures from the crime scene. "I did take a closer peek at those snipped brake fluid cords, and it looks like they were cut by one of the cutting tools in the box..."

"That's when I came in. Though, the tools are all wiped clean of prints," McGee finished. "Or they're all brand new."

"You were there, Agent McGee, they are brand new," Jamie confirmed. "This is just...kinky."

The agent thought he'd heard her wrong. "Uhm, sorry, pardon?"

"Y'know, _kinky_," Jamie emphasized. "Full of kinks. Like this whole case so far, y'know? This is just one kink that's got me seriously..._lost_." She reached for her baseball cap, put it on snuggly, and started pacing between the computer desk and the evidence table. "All of the tools were new, but I was able to find wire snips that had residue from the brake fluid—" She threw McGee a hopeless look. "Her prints _and_ dried perspiration were on it, too. Prints on the weapon, the toolbox, the tool—saliva on the victim's face, jeez—the last thing I want to assume is an attempted murder-suicide." Her pixie nose crinkled in contemplation. Jamie started tapping her fingers on the corner of the desk. "Agent McGee," she squeaked, "what happens when you don't do your job right under Special Agent Gibbs?"

McGee was startled by her question. "Please, call me Tim," he tried to calm her.

"Okay..."

"I'm pretty sure he won't do anything half as bad to you..." McGee cringed, although it was true. "...as he does to me."

Jamie looked more concerned about, what McGee assumed, would be her punishment for possibly incriminating Abby. She took a cleansing breath. "Sorry, Tim. Needed to, y'know. Let that out."

"Oh, no, don't be sorry—" McGee reached out.

"But I am sorry. Or I _sure_ will be."

McGee didn't know what else to say to make her frantic face go away. He took a step nearer to her. "I'll be glad to listen, whenever you need to...let something out."

Jamie half-smiled; it was half as bright as her smiles minutes before. "Thanks, Tim."

"Ms. Leigh," he nodded and smiled.

"Jamie," she glanced up from under her cap. "Please."

"Yes, Jamie... Any time." He smiled widely. It was her eyes; her hazel eyes definitely intrigued him most.

She didn't seem to notice his inward, drooling awe. The forensic specialist walked back to the table, where McGee was patiently waiting for her.

"Now…back to Ms. Sciuto's phone," she announced, still a little shaken.

McGee ogled at the familiar cellular device with her. He felt his chest sink and his mind flow with new ideas.

Abby's red Razr had been scratched on the back, possibly from dropping it. The chalky scratches were dark gray at the impact area near the bottom corner – most likely due to the cheap wearability of the red paint.

"Hmm." Jamie was especially interested in this detail. "Hold this, pretty please." She handed the phone to McGee's already gloved hands and twirled around him to fetch a fresh test tube. "This is getting kiiiiiiinky."

*** *** *** ***

"Have you ever read any of Agatha Christie's works, Mr. Palmer?"

Jimmy Palmer was in the middle of taking off his lightly stained gloves. "Uh...back in high school, yes Doctor," Palmer answered.

Ducky's spectacled eyes lit up. "Then would you be familiar with _Murder on the Orient Express_?"

Palmer threw away his gloves. "Vaguely." He shrugged and walked over next to Ducky, who was standing at Seaman Knight's side. "Does this remind you of it?"

"Why most certainly." Ducky gazed at the victim's stab wounds with an unusual wonder. "In that Hercule Poirot mystery, the victim was stabbed twelve times—only because the twelve people that killed him thought he deserved it. A true crime of retribution, yes... However, by the apparent severity of these lacerations—" He pointed at the vivid wounds. "—only one, retributive person could have killed this seaman with such consistency…" The ME, who was still wearing gloves, turned the victim's head a few degrees to see the lipstick stain on his cheek. "And that one person, I strongly believe, is still out there. Remind me to clean this off when we're done."

"Will do, Ducky."

Ducky and Palmer turned and saw Gibbs entering the morgue.

"Ah Jethro," Ducky greeted. "I always thought a personal appearance was better than a virtual one."

Gibbs walked up to the opposite side of Seaman Knight. The dark lipstick distracted him from the darker cuts on the victim. "Tell me everything."

Ducky noticed his friend's blank stare at the seaman's face. "Considerable blood loss from the multiple wounds was a major contributing factor," he tried to get Gibbs to avert his gaze. "From the angle and the lack of precision in these wounds, the killer probably didn't care if the victim would die the first go. So many vital points were hit in the killer's fit of rage. One scratch, might I call it, is different from the others, however." He pointed to one of the lighter cuts on the seaman's chest—around the collarbone. "This one looks more like the killer was swinging the blade at the seaman threateningly, swinging the blade this way and that, like this." Ducky waved an imaginary knife left and right at Gibbs. "Except more vigorously and violently, perhaps. The trail continues on the seaman's face riiiight here..." He pointed at a very minute scratch on the left cheek bone.

"What about these bruises?"

"_Struggle_," Ducky said grimly. "It was the only conclusion I could arrive at, seeing as those were not made post mortem. They were most likely made by a gloved pair of hands—no finger- or handprints. It appears the killer and his victim grappled—which explains the mild bruising on the arms—before the killer tried to strangle him. I _didn't_ conclude anything for _this_ other discovery..."

Gibbs kept watching and listening to Ducky, one detail following the other from his esteemed colleague and friend. If the killer and the seaman were caught in a fight, what was Abby doing then...? Unless Abby was caught fighting the seaman.... Gibbs shook his head and squinted at whatever Ducky was pointing at. He had to stop thinking that way, at least for this case. No...he wanted to, but he had to consider every possible explanation. He wanted to think his keeping Abby in the interrogation room was for her own safety, and for nothing else. Then again, he had yet to re-visit Ms. Leigh in the forensics lab, and McGee's words weren't very promising.

"...and the Loch Ness monster emerged from the Atlantic and slayed all the townsfolk with its—"

Gibbs whipped his head around. "_What?_"

"Ah, good, those ears of yours are still sharp as ever," Ducky remarked. "I'll repeat if you wish." One look from Gibbs confirmed so. "Well then, Jethro. I hope you don't scare Ms. Jamie too much, because she's still waiting on results for this mystery substance lodged in the back of the seaman's head." The ME turned Seaman Knight's head to a certain degree and pointed near the base of the skull; there was a dull cut-like ridge deep in his hair, where the very dark, murky-green substance was. Some of it looked powdery, but some of the other minute pieces resembled tiny shards of glass.

"Knocked out with a bottle?" Gibbs simply asked.

Ducky looked at his friend. "That's what I think," he agreed. "But the color is off, possibly from the blood. And you know what they say about assuming things, Jethro..."

Gibbs glanced over the body before starting to leave. "At this point, Duck, I'm more of an ass than you'll ever be."

He left the room, still as tense as he was when he entered the morgue. Palmer was still standing off to the side, watching anxiously as Gibbs departed without acknowledging Jimmy at all. The assistant relaxed once both the sliding morgue and elevator doors closed, and he went back to Ducky's side. Ducky wore a perplexed face that was hard to pass up.

"What's wrong, Doctor?" Palmer asked.

"Should I have taken that as a compliment?" Ducky inquired rather quietly.

*** *** *** ***

Gibbs took another cursory check at his cell phone. He'd put it on silent (after a battle with the button configuration, the stupid technology) since he was attacked by three or so phone calls at the same time back at Plush 9. He looked again as he was standing in the elevator. Ziva had called him a few times after he hung up on her. In a way, his mossad agent was right. Not even 24 hours had passed since the crime, but Gibbs definitely thought he should have had this all figured out by now. He looked at the buttons in the elevator and briefly considered going to the interrogation room... The longer his eyes lingered on the button for that floor, the more he wanted to see her, until he could feel an unfamiliar ache in his gut. He shook his head when the elevator bell rang, and the doors opened.

"You lying son of a bitch!"

Gibbs rocked back on his heels.

Jamie Leigh was leaning against the left side of the red hallway. Gibbs could see the steam coming out of her ears. She gripped her phone with an ungloved hand that had earthy, organic-looking jewelry. Jamie's back was facing Gibbs, but he could hear her as if she were shouting at his face. Abby's replacement spun around nonetheless on her ballet slippers and looked at Gibbs with a deer-in-headlights stare. She was also wearing her St. Louis "thinking cap" as he recalled.

Gibbs arched a brow. "Need the elevator?" he pointed behind him.

Jamie looked between him and the elevator car and shrugged. She covered her phone receiver. "McGee's waiting for you in the lab, I have to deal with this moron first—" she hurried to say before she segwayed back to her heated conversation. "—I DON'T CARE! Why didn't you tell me before!?"

Gibbs made way for Jamie, who stomped into the elevator and punched the close-door button. A feeling of suspicion fleetingly passed over the agent. He turned around, the doors starting to close in front of Jamie.

"Who is that?" he mouthed.

Jamie stopped in mid-bark. "Soon-to-be-ex-boyfriend," she silently hissed. The elevator doors seemed to close in Gibbs' face. After three ex-wives, he still didn't know much about women.

As Ms. Leigh had said, McGee was standing in the lab at the evidence table. The lab was unusually silent, and the silence was strangely deafening. Gibbs was tempted to walk over to the Bose stereo next to Abby's desk, but the object in McGee's hands pulled him in the other direction. His field agent didn't seem to notice him yet, as the Elf Lord was engrossed with his tinkering work.

Gibbs crept up behind McGee. "You better have something good, McGee," he growled.

McGee nearly dropped Abby's phone. "Boss," he gasped. "I-I was just trying to turn on her phone—"

The small screen lit up with the phone service's logo.

McGee glanced at the phone, then back at Gibbs. "Well, while that boots up, I'll show you what we've been working on."

Gibbs listened to everything McGee said with a scowl that was impossible to erase. Abby's ID picture came up so many times on the computer screen during McGee's presentation. When his field agent walked over to the deadweight toolbox, Gibbs saw the address on the inside cover before McGee could babble on further.

"Where is this?" he questioned and cut off McGee.

McGee hesitated; he felt like he was running across a mine field, and Gibbs would explode in his face at any second. "Lemme pull up the search results." He walked over to one of the computers and started typing furiously and opening windows. "Jamie said it was a small warehouse within our original target area." He pulled up a map pinpointing the address from the toolbox. "It's exactly at the edge of our range—just enough blocks to set the car and let it…" He didn't finish his sentence, for Gibbs' stare was burning right through him.

"What about the samples from Ducky?" Gibbs tried to ask calmly.

The mass spectrometer beeped on cue. Both men turned to the machine, with Gibbs looking back at McGee keenly. The cyber agent looked back at his boss cautiously. "Jamie said there was some of that unknown substance on Abby's phone, so she put both samples in for examination." He walked over to the computer next to the mass spectrometer and pulled up the results.

"I'll take over from here," someone squeaked.

Gibbs and McGee looked to see Jamie slowly enter the lab. Her eyes were puffy and her cheeks were reddish against the rest of her paler skin. McGee pulled back sharply; Gibbs continued to look at her when she took McGee's place at the computer.

"Whaddya know," Jamie sniffed and wiped her eye. "Traces of iron oxides, and on the phone, enough traces of hydrocarbons to make up…motor oil. Weird." She turned to Gibbs. "Iron oxides are used to color glass—in this case, it was green glass, or a color close to it. But I dunno about the motor oil…" Jamie's yellow eyes suddenly pounced on the evidence table. "Oh, Tim, you got the phone to work—yay!" Her nose scrunched up in a delighted smile, which contrasted greatly with her tear-streaked cheeks. She danced away to get a new pair of latex gloves.

McGee sighed in relief, seeing Jamie happier, though he couldn't ignore the strange look on Gibbs' face.

A ghost of a smirk appeared across his boss's lips. "_Tim_?"

McGee took a sudden interest in looking at his shoes.

"Lessee here…interesting background…" Jamie held the phone like she was ready to text a novel. "The last person she called was…" Her eyes widened and she spun around, holding out the phone to the two men. "I…I dunno if this should be a good thing," she said with a truly confused expression.

Gibbs looked at her, but grabbed a glove and hastily put it on. He took Abby's phone and squinted at the list of recent calls. The last call listed was…his cell number. Before that was 911, and then his cell number again—all three entries the only ones dated from yesterday. Gibbs tried to see more information, but the dang buttons wouldn't cooperate. He saw both McGee and Jamie approach him, offering to assist him, but he turned away from them. He finally was able to find the times of the three calls. The first one to his cell phone was within 2400, around the time they left Plush 9. The 911 call followed a minute after the first. The second and last time his number was dialed was around 0200. The timing didn't make sense. The struggle couldn't have lasted that long…

"Here." Gibbs handed Abby's phone back to Jamie and ripped off his glove.

The desk phone rang from Abby's desk.

"God damn," Gibbs sighed. "_McGee_."

McGee was already jogging to Abby's desk. Gibbs checked his own phone again: _5 Missed Calls._

"Forensics," McGee answered. He immediately looked at Gibbs and held out the phone.

"Dammit, McGee, just tell her to wait!" Gibbs barked at him. Jamie jumped from where she was standing. "Meet me in the squad room in five with that address!" He stormed away and added under his breath, "Who knows what Tony does when he's alone…"

Jamie and McGee looked at each other; when they looked back to see Gibbs, he was gone.

He took the flight of stairs and made it to the bullpen faster than he thought. He'd left Tony to watch the security tapes, and the senior field agent even made a bag of popcorn when Gibbs left to go see Ducky. The buttery smell entered his nose when he walked into the empty bullpen.

"DiNozzo…" Gibbs glared at the vacant desk with the half-eaten Orville Redenbacher popcorn bag. The TV screen on the AV cart showed paused footage from the dance floor, which was on the second floor of the club. Gibbs peered at the screen and saw, in the middle of the crowd, Abby with Seaman Knight. Abby had her arms wrapped around the victim, whose hands were on her waist. Their lips were inches—mere breaths from each other.

Gibbs had to look away.

_Riiiiing-ring! Riiiiing-ring!_

His desk phone called him from his daze, but the ringing made him snap. He strode across the pen and didn't bother to check the caller ID. As he yanked the receiver, an obscenity burned the tip of his tongue.

"I am on your six, Gibbs."

As far as he could sense it, no one was really behind him; but it felt like Ziva was holding him at gunpoint. Gibbs licked his lips and clenched the receiver.

"Why?"

"Because I see no sense anymore in watching one of our own," Ziva snapped. Before Gibbs could let out his anger, Ziva stopped him. "Abby needs you, and you have abandoned her. The one who should be in that glass cage is _you_—"

Gibbs threw down the receiver and yelled out something unintelligible. The back elevator opened up and McGee entered the squad room, with the address written on a post-it note. The cyber agent screeched to a halt when he laid his eyes on Gibbs.

"Boss?" McGee moved into his desk warily. He was halfway into his desk chair.

"Get your ass over here," Gibbs barked. "You and Tony are going to that warehouse—"

"Where's Tony?" McGee's eyes wandered around the pen.

Gibbs didn't answer. On his way out the pen, he managed to toss the bag of popcorn to McGee without spilling it. "_Not_ doing his job."

McGee glanced at the popcorn and back up at Gibbs vanishing into the red corridor. He was left with the magical mystery of Tony's desk, and the feature presentation on the AV cart. After taking a good look at the screen, he could see why Gibbs was even crosser than he usually was. McGee couldn't eat one kernel.

*** *** *** ***

Ziva hung up her phone and started for the door.

"Whoa, where do you think you're going?" A hand held her arm.

Ziva glared at Tony's hand, then his face. "If no one's going to be with Abby, _I_ will be the one."

"But you can't, Gibbs is rocking Abby." Tony made a face, to which Ziva returned. "You know....Gibbs's handy dandy technique."

"Where his 'hands do the talking'?" Ziva mocked and drew quotes around her words.

"No," Tony gave her a look. "'Rocking the Baby.' He does it to all potential suspects..." Tony trailed off in regret and braced for the worst from Ziva.

The liaison cussed in another language and rolled her eyes. "Why did you even come here?"

"To see...Abbs," Tony answered carefully. He peered through the one-way window and raised his brows. He hadn't really paid a good amount of attention until now. The dark angel was curled up in a ball on the table and held her stuffed hippo Bert close to her heart. Her eyes lacked luster and stared vacantly back at him and Ziva. She squeezed the stuffed animal and let out its usually comforting fart sound. Tony covered his mouth.

"You see it, too," Ziva stated rather than asked.

Tony shook his head. "Usually Gibbs would bust through the door and catch her off guard....how long has she been here?"

"Since you went to that club, I think, but it feels _much_ longer." Ziva tilted her head. "And usually, from what I have seen, it is Abby that catches Gibbs off guard." She tapped her foot impatiently. "I am going in there, and I don't care what Gibbs thinks."

Ziva's dark waves brushed across Tony's face before he could hold her back again. "Hey—" he interjected. "At least let me tell you some background info before you go in and..._mossad_ her."

The mossad squinted at him incredulously. "_Mossad_ is Hebrew for 'institution.'" She stuck her neck out at him and called him something in Hebrew, most likely something unflattering. "And I am not going in there to _question_ her." And she opened and slammed the door without hearing more.

Tony turned to see Ziva entering the interrogation room. Abby sat up on the table and gasped, hugging and making Bert fart again.

"Oh God, Ziva?" Abby got off the table and shied away. "Gibbs must think I'm a mass-murdering f—"

"Abby."

Abby then gaped at her. She recognized that inflection to her name. "Were you the one...?"

Ziva nodded. "Please. Sit down." There must have been something wrong in her "American" accent, because Abby robotically sat down and kept her arms tightly around her stuffed hippo. The girl kept her now petrified eyes on the table and away from Ziva, who sat down with Abby at the table. The fear in her eyes became washed over with heartache.

"If you're here to warm me up, what's Gibbs gonna do with me?" She looked up at Ziva. "Where is he, Ziva?"

"I'm not here to warm you up," Ziva uncrossed her arms and folded her hands on the table's surface. "And...I don't know where he is at present." She glanced to her left, remember who was behind the one-way glass.

Abby looked at her cagily. "He sent _you_ to watch me," she stated. "That's gotta mean something."

Ziva paused. "Yes. But, Abby—"

"I don't think I could even touch you, Ziva," Abby said, putting down Bert, "let alone try one of your kung-fu-assassin moves on you."

Ziva laughed. "I know you will not hurt me," she let a small smile stay on her lips. "You are too....nice," she couldn't find another word that could describe her.

A similar, phantom smile appeared across Abby's cheeks. "Thanks, Ziva," Abby chuckled. "I wish others thought the same right now." She let out a sigh that drained her of the very life left in her.

Ziva wanted to reach out and touch her, at the very least, but she kept her fingers laced. "I...I'm sorry, Abby."

Abby perked up and took Bert in her arms again, this time more affectionately and relaxed. "For what?"

"That I must keep you here."

Abby looked away again and squeezed Bert, but with less intensity. "You're just following an order," she shrugged. She let her head rest on the hippo's head. She started humming tune completely alien to Ziva.

The door busted open. Abby and Ziva jumped in their seats, with Bert farting along in surprise.

"An order you just violated."

Ziva's eyes were slit. Abby's maroon lips frowned.

Gibbs stood in the doorway and kept his eyes only on Abby. Abby looked back into his eyes like he had just hurt her. In a way.

"Sorry Ziva, I tried," Tony's voice came over the intercom. "But you know how it is—"

Ziva shot a glare at her reflection in the window, before transferring it to Gibbs. "You did not say I could _not_ speak with her."

Abby watched Gibbs stride to Ziva and stare her down. "I can get technical with you, too, if that's what you want. And DiNozzo—" He called without leaving Ziva's beady glare. "—you know where you're going. Now."

Tony groaned. "To McGeek, as we speak." Tony's exit was audible through the open door of the interrogation room.

"Interrogation _observation_," he continued with Ziva. He gestured toward the door with a nod of his head.

Ziva didn't move for a second, but she slowly rose, keeping her brief distance with Gibbs, and lingered behind him before she stepped through the doorway.

"On your six," she murmured, only for him to hear.

Gibbs listened to her footsteps and the adjacent door's opening and closing. He closed the interrogation room door.

"Ziva," he had to make sure one last time.

Her voice came over the speakers. "On your six," she said in affected cheer.

Gibbs sat down. This was going to be one of the hardest parts. He had already sensed it in her eyes.

Abby put away Bert next to her overnight bag and rested her hands on her lap. She seemed to shrink while she looked at him, with her puffy eyes, behind her dark lashes.

"Don't slouch," he said softly. "It's not good for you."

A line appeared between her brows. She straightened up, her hands still hidden under the table, and she looked down. She didn't look like she was ready to strike up a conversation, like she usually would.

Gibbs moved his hands closer to her across the table. "How much do you remember from last night, Abbs?"

Abby's eyes became half a shade greener at the sound of her name. "Not a lot," she admitted. She finally looked at him; her eyes brushed over his, but they stopped at his nose instead. "Flashbacks come and go...but the feelings..." She absentmindedly put a hand over the stitched broken heart on her shirt. She started shaking her braids. "No, not much at all, Gibbs."

"Try."

Abby looked into his eyes doubtfully. "I've tried so hard, I get headaches, Gibbs. They're so vivid, but I can't hold onto them."

"Try _harder_."

"I am!" Abby cried.

Gibbs leaned on his elbows on the table. "Then you would remember."

Abby shrank back from him. Her eyes searched through the fragments of her memories on the table surface. He could hear her breathing get faster, her chest rising and falling and her shoulders tensing up.

Gibbs closed his eyes and took a deep breath himself. "What do you remember—starting from when you and...Seaman Knight left the club."

Abby's eyes widened. They _did_ go to a club—_Plush 9!_ Yes, that much came back to her. The dancing, the kissing—it happened there. "We were leaving..." She kept her eyes on the table, still rummaging through her memory. She suddenly blushed. "I...I kissed him on the cheek before that." She pointed at her own cheek. "Then....then it gets real blurry after that."

"Think, Abby. What did you do after you left with him?"

"I don't know," Abby frowned.

"You _do_ know." Gibbs tried to find a way to jog her memory. The evidence... "Your prints were on the murder weapon and the toolbox on the gas pedal. Ducky found green glass in the back of the victim's head—does that strike a chord?"

Abby's mouth hung open. She peered at the invisible fragments on the table...

_Her hands grabbing him. Shattering glass... Jason barely had time to scream._

Abby covered her mouth with her smilie-face hand.

_A flash of red...plastic perhaps. Her hand gripped around it. Shadowy movement... One swift swipe at Jason. The shattering glass again._

"Oh no," she moaned.

"What Abby?" Gibbs wanted to hold her hand.

An all-too familiar feeling began to resurface. Abby trembled. "Oh my God, oh my God..."

"Abby!"

_The knife. It was red. Like the blood on her hands. Jason's body....the first cut suddenly crystal clear._

"I cut him. Right here." She pointed across her collar bone. "I...I stabbed him. I _did_ kill him, I did. With a box-cutter—" Tears brimmed her eyes. Abby covered her face and cried. "The pain...it was too much."

Gibbs listened and watched her crumble all over again. "Why..." he choked. "Why would you kill him? You seemed happy from what I've heard."

Abby started pouring out to him, more than he had wanted. "I didn't know he was in the Navy...I...I was angry. The pain, there was too much pain....oh God." She buried her head in her arms and sobbed into the table.

Gibbs rose from the table and walked to the one-way glass, trying to look only at his reflection. "And the glass?"

"Some kind of wine bottle...in a parking lot—Gibbs, please, lock me up now!"

Gibbs turned away from his reflection and back at Abby. He got a confession, just not from the person he wanted.

_You're _not_ giving up on her, Gibbs_, a voice in his head mentally slapped him in the back of the head. _There has to be more, there always is._

_But she just confessed...and the evidence..._

_Screw the evidence!_

Ziva could see the internal turmoil through Gibbs' shaking head and shifting eyes. If she had stayed in the room with them, she would have at least held her hand. Ziva folded her arms at the whole picture; something just wasn't right.

Much against Ziva's expectations, Gibbs disappeared from the room, and abandoned Abby once again. Abby sobbed even more.

"He hates me. He _hates_ me," she wept.

* * *

**A/N:** And everyone's probably gonna hate_ me _for writing that ending XDDD It's gonna have to get worse before it gets better, I guess. Gah. Anyways, here's another shot at having a "walk-on" role. Remember: _you have to be the first or second person to answer it right_. Sorry if I didn't clarify that earlier :( Now, here is the question:

_Both Pauley Perrette (Abby) and Cote de Pablo (Ziva) have been in commercials for what car company?_

For some reason, I feel like that's another easy question :S I wish I could put everyone in this story, lol! Don't know when I'll be able to update next, though, hopefully sooner than later. Still love you all, as always :] (~Annie)

P.S. Reviews are also love ;)


	8. Chapter 8

**A/N:** Hey guys. Nothing much, besides the fact that school is cruel, and I'm a slow writer :P So slow, that only one of the last winners is in this chapter. Who is it? ;) The last question about PP and CP is still on; I should have said to _Youtube_ it as well...hmm. Endless, endless thanks for y'all reading :_)

* * *

The door swung wide open. Ziva remained completely still through the tempest that surged into the observation room.

"Lost...scared...." she uttered. "...and overwhelmed."

A harsh, warm breeze blew through her hair.

"_Ya think?_" Gibbs snarled, inches from her profile.

Ziva refused eye contact with him. "I was not talking about Abby."

The storm died down. Gibbs took a step back and turned toward the one-way glass.

Filling their ears was the continuing mantra that Abby whimpered to herself. Holding herself tightly, she began to pace between the ends of the table.

"He hates me...he hates me..." She paused and stared at the door longingly. "...He still hates me..."

Gibbs touched the glass, a tangible barrier from Abby. A barrier, he suddenly realized, he too hastily put between them.

"I still think she is innocent," Ziva spoke. "Has she not said before that she's the only one who can murder without a trace of evidence?"

Gibbs didn't answer. His fingers slipped down the pane.

Abby's eyes became fixed on the glass. She was still drained by her tears, but nothing could ever take away her own gut feeling—something she quickly acquired after being with Gibbs. Wiping the stray drops from her eyes, Abby walked up to the one-way window and pressed her hands on them. She peered into it, as if trying to see Gibbs on the other side. Her cheeks tingled when a few more salty drops escaped from her. Abby then pressed one of her warm cheeks against the glass. She found herself breathing heavily, trying to reach stability in her excited lungs. The struggle was over—Abby could feel it. She had taken someone's life; and as a price, she would lose a part of hers.

Gibbs gazed at Abby pressed on the glass before him. A few more inches, and her arms could have been wrapped around his neck....like she did with the seaman. And he could place his hands on her waist and close in—

"Sorry Ziva," Abby suddenly said. The Goth girl stepped away from the window. A thin trail of water ran down from where her cheek was pressed. Abby sniffled. "I know he's in there, I can sense it..."

Both Ziva and Gibbs stared with anticipation.

And Abby began to sign.

_I still love you, Gibbs._

Gibbs blinked. He frantically started to sign back to her, but he felt Ziva's reminding stare rest on him. Gibbs finally looked at Ziva in the eyes, to be surprised at the warmer, yet urgent tone in them.

"Go back," her voice sounded demanding, but her stare said otherwise.

And Gibbs left as if it was an order. The door clicked softly behind him.

Ziva turned back to the window; there was an unusual calm after the storm.

*** *** *** ***

"God, Probie, I thought you of all people would be able to program the stupid GPS." Tony slapped the aforementioned device.

McGee drummed his fingers like he hadn't heard a thing. "I chose not to."

Tony shot lasers at him from behind the wheel, then looked back at the road. "Since when do you McChoose not to McProgram the car's McGPS?" He paused before each McGee-ified noun to give it the right inflection.

McGee rolled his eyes. "Since the warehouse is not that far from the crime scene..." He trailed off. "...and, now that I think of it, not too far from Gibbs' neighborhood either."

"McGasp."

With a sharp turn of the sedan, the two agents arrived at their destination. McGee craned his neck. From where they drove in, it looked more like a large garage than a warehouse. Tony parked the car next to the entrance where, Tony thought aloud, the Wal-Mart trucks would shadily unload unmarked cardboard boxes – and that was why there was a mysterious box-cutter knife to begin with.

The wide garage door opened on the first try – it was unlocked. Tony had his fingers wrapped around the handle and eyed McGee before pushing up the door enough for them to duck under and enter. Tony got in first.

"Watch your head, McDulla."

"McDulla?" McGee couldn't believe all the names Tony was pulling out.

"McDulla Oblongata," he articulated from behind the door. Tony held the entrance for McGee. "It's the part of your elf brain that—" Tony couldn't finish, as if he was cut off.

"That's in charge of involuntary functions, I know," McGee rolled his eyes.

"—FREEZE PROBIE!" Tony yelled.

The door slid down with a metallic _bang!_ without waiting for McGee.

McGee started to panic. _Someone must be in the warehouse…with Tony..._

"Tony!" he fisted the door. He instinctively grabbed his weapon from its holster. McGee crouched down with his SIG ready to go.

A minute later the door opened, and Tony completely passed over McGee.

"Uh, hey, what happened?" McGee asked, feeling lost and left out. He thought Tony was acting out, but his partner's face was dead and grave.

"Secure the area, Probie," Tony commanded and jogged to the other side of the building.

McGee's heart started racing. He glanced at the garage door. "What about—"

"It's clear!" Tony barked in Gibbs-fashion. He stalked around the corner with his gun.

McGee unwillingly mirrored Tony's path on the opposite side of the warehouse-garage. The building was slightly aged, maybe twenty years' worth of lime and water stains at the corners. There was a side door that had a padlock at the end of McGee's side. Foggy windows stared down at McGee high on the building's side, but he didn't see anything behind them. McGee reached the end and stayed glued to the corner of the flank.

"Clear!" he yelled.

He didn't know why, but a feeling of impending danger crept up behind him and tapped him on the shoulder. The cyber agent held up his gun.

"If you point that thing any closer, Probie, I'll shoot your typewriter. With my whole round."

Tony appeared from the corner, holding his hands up. His SIG was back in holster under his jacket.

McGee lowered his weapon. "Tony, _what_ just happened?"

"We're too late," Tony made a dissatisfied face. "Get the camera—get everything."

"Not until I see this." McGee didn't even know what _this _was.

"Probie—!" Tony roared. He stopped himself, still aiming a death glare at McGee, and motioned for the probie to follow him.

Around the corner, a distinct pair of tire tracks was burned into the cement ground. They curved and faded away toward the back street. But before he continued on, McGee saw another set of tire tracks on the street itself, which looked more like the tracks the black sedan would've made…

Tony led McGee down the rear of the building until there was a similar garage-like door. This one had window panels, which were also strangely fogged and scratched with age. He could recognize the light flooding through the other entrance he had almost came through. The late afternoon sun didn't make the inside any brighter.

Tony held the handle. "I don't think Abbs remembers _this_, McGruff." He jumped up to push open the door completely.

The dimness inside was blinding. If McGee was right in his assumptions, this hybrid warehouse-garage really hadn't been used much, if at all. The hydraulic lifts, good for two cars were raised high and were rotting there. Various equipment lay against the nearest wall, their metallic corpses either hanging from hooks or lying, useless, on a table similar to Gibb's basement desk. To the far right were a few doors distorted by little light of the space. McGee took a step forward—

He stumbled back.

Yards away, in front of one of the doors, man lay sprawled on the concrete floor.

*** *** *** ***

Abby sunk fell into her seat and collapsed onto the table. Her sadness was fading away, thankfully, but she felt completely drained. Her fingers still tingled with the words she'd tried to say…

_I don't think he got it._ Abby peeked from behind her arms. The door was still shut; the window was still a useless, stupid window. The sight triggered a new emotion to fill her empty shell. She balled her hands into fists. It was like an insurmountable wall of darkness stood before her. And behind it was Gibbs. Except, there was the one-way glass; there might as well have been a black curtain draped over it. Abby closed her eyes and continued to wander in her mind's abyss. She was so sure she'd slaughtered the man she held a budding affection for... She wasn't so sure about which man she had just destroyed now—whether it was with a box-cutter or her equally sharp words. Abby let herself descend deeper and deeper in her self-loathing. Her chest rose and fell in tumultuous waves.

And at that point, she realized she was already sitting in a prison. A little black box that Abby was trapped in while her guards kept watch. If another eternity passed by again, Abby was just about ready to shoot herself...

A thought slithered into her head. She dug in her night bag by her foot and found her extra set of keys—her car key, apartment key, a novelty skeleton key with Jack Skellington on it. She thumbed through those, a black Batman keychain, and a purple dragonfly charm, before she found what she wanted. It had always been with her keys for easy access; you never know when you'll need a mini-Swiss army knife in front of your own home.

It was small, but effective. Abby felt a strange, liberating smirk form on her face. She flipped out the secondary blade, her eyes flitting between the keen metal and her delicate skin. Everything else around her disappeared into the darkness.

So she didn't see the hand that swiftly grabbed her wrist. The red puny knife jumped from Abby's stunned hand and clattered on the floor. Abby choked on words.

Gibbs held a thick file in one hand, and her wrist in the other. Inches from her face, his eyes held her entire being—reaching inside her and tugging at emotions that wouldn't, couldn't come out. The blueness of Gibbs' gaze faded into a softer somber hue, yet they still pierced through her like a thousand bullets.

"Don't," he whispered.

Abby still couldn't break her stupefied silence, but Gibbs understood it loud and clear. He walked over, picked up the knife, and, sliding it into his pocket, sat down in front of Abby again.

"Gibbs," she wavered.

The silver-haired fox said not a word. He proceeded to open the manila folder, which was filled with nothing but glossy pictures. He neatly placed each one next to each other and spread all the pictures in an organized grid on the table. Abby stopped staring at Gibbs and looked down, only to be nauseated with both disgust and confusion. She cringed at Jason's torn body and the graze mark and all the cuts in his flesh and even the smashed back of his head; she squinted at the less graphic pictures—a cleaned box-cutter knife, a pair of wire snips, a tool box, and enough pictures of Jason's car to fill a whole memory card. The front seat. The wheel. Her purse on the floor. The backseat. The crashed car itself. The broken brakes. The open trunk. The license plate.

There were as many words on the tip of Abby's tongue as there were pictures on the table. She was so engrossed in them, she didn't see or hear Gibbs rise and stride over behind her. Abby laid her head on the heels of her hands again and let another breath drain her.

She felt Gibbs hands on her shoulders and her back. His touch moved in soothing circles, reminding Abby she was still alive. She closed her eyes and turned away, and let Gibbs' massage ease her senses.

"Don't look away, Abbs," Gibbs' warm breath brushed her hair.

Abby turned back but didn't open her eyes. She wanted to lie on the table and let Gibbs rub down the rest of her body... "What do you want me to do, Gibbs? I already confessed," she frowned.

"No." His hands stayed on her shoulders. His breath came to her ear. "I want you to think. And remember. Everything." Gibbs gently squeezed her shoulders. "Please..."

Abby opened her eyes.

*** *** *** ***

It was a white male, flaxy blonde, with gray eyes, a prominent nose, cleft chin; and now he was sprawled on his stomach in an old warehouse.

McGee took a whole body shot and a close up. He took a picture of the way his hands, arms, and legs were frozen in awkward positions. He took another photo of the tiny lines forever imprinted around his neck. And one more of his dead, cloudy eyes for good measure.

"No ID," Tony scowled. "He had a rubber in his pocket, not exactly the best—"

McGee suddenly glared at Tony. "Shouldn't we call Gibbs?"

"He's rocking Abby, I'll call in a sec," Tony indifferently answered. He knelt at the body's left side and started searching around the victim's neck.

"Must you always use that term?"

Tony almost answered, but he caught the exasperated look on McGee's face. "_Hey_. Like it or not, Abbs is being interrogated by Gibbs as a suspect, as we speak." The lack of better words rang lamely in Tony's ears. He continued scouring the area around the victim's neck. "For all I know, he _could_ be using his hands to get the answers out of her."

A flash blinded Tony. "Ah—! PROBIE!" he flinched and dropped on his butt.

McGee stood up with the camera in hand and breathed heavily through his nose.

"Hey, McGee, cool it."

"We should _call Gibbs_."

"Rule number—"

"—I don't care, this could be connected to our case! Abby couldn't have possibly killed anyone while Gibbs rocked her—" His train of thought suddenly swerved off course and he left it at that. McGee shook his head, giving up.

Tony couldn't help smiling. He helped himself up, but his hand slipped on something on the floor. Before completely falling on his bottom again, Tony put a firm knee on the floor and groped around for the unknown substance. His fingers kept gathering dust. He reached closer to the victim's neck and found it exactly. It was thin, almost untraceable with poor lighting, but Tony got what he'd been looking for, and picked it up.

"Catgut…?" McGee asked.

Tony waited. "Your tongue?"

"No—catgut strings for instruments." McGee stepped over, his eyes becoming slit.

"You played an instrument when you were a kid, McGoo?"

McGee hesitated. "Violin—but it looks coarser than catgut. Will you please stop laughing?"

"Okay…" Tony sobered up. "This wouldn't happen to match those marks on his neck, would it?"

McGee glanced at the victim's neck. "Oh…he was wearing something." A chain was peeping from behind the victim's collar.

Tony was buggeyed. "What? I was looking at his neck for—"

"No, you were looking at his condom." McGee pulled at the chain. "Dogtags?"

"Gimme that," Tony pushed McGee aside and pinched the chain. "Yes, it is indeed a chain for the dogtags of Monsieur…"

Tony and McGee looked at each other.

"Arnold Meyer Knight," McGee uttered.

"Call Gibbs," ordered Tony.

* * *

**A/N:** Yeah, the long-chapter streak's been broken now lol. On a random note, do y'all like the "walk-on" roles - I mean, should I continue them? And, for some reason, I'm feeling analytical-ish thanks to my Creative Writing class in school, any constructive criticism would be awesome :) (~Annie)


	9. Chapter 9

**A/N:** Hey y'all! :D I'm taking advantage of the three-day weekend my school issued, so I finally finished Chapter 9! In my absence, I've acquired a beta, one of my good friends outside school; I've also decided to discontinue the "walk-on roles." I dunno. Sorry for lack of interesting words - today (or yesterday technically) was my school's open house, so I'm terribly pooped and in desperate need of R+R and/or plain ol' sleep. Though, some R+R from you guys wouldn't be bad either ;)

BTW, I had to modify the last/final winner's role from the second-to-last trivia question; I originally had a character in mind, but I had to scrap it to keep the flow. Instead, two birds with one stone were killed in the making of this chapter XDDD

Without further ado, here is Chapter 9!

Much love, (~Annie)  


* * *

"Say _something_, Abbs."

Abby hugged herself and rocked back and forth like a swing caught in the wind. Her eyes still jumped from photo to photo.

Gibbs grabbed at the corners of the table and Abby's chair. "Did he hurt you?" he interrogated, his stare fierce.

Abby continued holding her arms. The faint memory of pain in her body echoed, as if triggered by his words. "No...?"

"He must have _done_ something to piss you off."

"I..." Abby laid her shaking head in her hands.

"You _do _remember." He nodded at the photos.

"Gibbs..." Her face twisted in agony.

"Abby...?" He hovered over her, still clenching the table and chair.

_A throbbing aching that seemed to swell mercilessly – in waves that crawled up her spine and completely paralyzed her... Yellow light shone dimly in the corners of her vision..._

"Pain..." Abby whimpered. "That's all I remember. Besides killing him, of course."

"Abby," Gibbs said tersely. He peered into her searching eyes that wouldn't look back at him. "_Who_ hurt you then?"

"Myself?" she asked the lights on the ceiling.

Gibbs stood erect. "You almost did."

Abby winced. She tried to distract herself and touched one of the photos without really thinking. It was the one of the backseat. For some reason, she couldn't lift her eyes from it.

Her silver-haired fox took note of this. He came beside her, their faces next to each other, and examined the picture with her. Abby remained silent. It was the backseat of one of the smallest sedans he'd ever seen. Plain, gray fabric seats, old crumbs, and dust balls.

A minute, perhaps, passed like sand through the hourglass. Gibbs turned to Abby; one centimeter closer and he would've kissed her like he always would. It was very tempting.

"Was it here?" he shot in the dark, hoping to hit something.

Abby tilted her head. The unknown connection keeping her on that photo faded. "Was what where?"

Gibbs got up and sat across from her. He reached for her hands, which were now lying limp at the edge of the table. He didn't rest his gaze anywhere else but on Abby. He caught her jade, jaded eyes and kept them from falling away from him completely again. He felt Abby bring their hands together, her soft pulse beating against his rough skin. She dipped her attention back into the picture of the backseat. Gibbs breathed deeply.

"You still haven't moved from that photo."

"I know..."

He rubbed her hand with his thumb. "Go back."

Abby asked with her eyes.

"Back to last night. Back…_there_." He nodded at the picture.

"It's the backseat of a car," she shrugged. "With enough Dorito crumbs to last the little dust bunnies a life—"

"Was that where you were hurt?" he questioned.

Abby started to shrink and her body tensed. She kept looking and staring and analyzing the ridiculously plain photograph and still got nothing.

Gibbs rested his elbows on the table, blocking some of the other photos from her. "Were you and Jason _together_ in the backse—"

"_Gibbs!_" she gasped. Abby ripped her hands from him and sprang from her seat. "For your information, Gibbs, not every relationship I enter makes me dive into his pants—let alone the backseat of his car! Ugh!" Her eyes sparkled. "There was a rare, rare sweetness about him that whenever we were together......."

"Together," Gibbs repeated. He had folded his hands quietly and mentally head-slapped himself.

Abby meandered through her thoughts, all the while whispering to herself, "Together…" like it was a magic word. She paced. "_The more we get together...together...together..._" she sang.

Gibbs perked up. It was the same melody he heard Abby hum in the showers.

"_The more we get together, the happier we'll be,_" she sang louder. "_'Cause your friends are my friends, and my friends are your friends – _the more we get together the happier we'll be, Gibbs!" Abby jumped excitedly.

He wanted to say something to that statement... "I don't understand."

"It's a song!" Abby nearly shouted. "We used to sing it all the time just for fun, 'cause he'd always be away, and now I know why," she rambled. "We were singing it last night..."

"_Shut up! Shut! UP!"_

_Fuzzy lights, more white than yellow. She stared right into them. She was looking up. She was lying down. But she was moving... It was the backseat of a car._

"Abbs," Gibbs called.

The girl didn't move.

_She couldn't move. Her hands were bound with silver._

"_Stop singing that fucking song!"_

She stepped back, away from the disturbing backseat and its filthy fabric lining.

_Her head fell to the side. She shut up._

Gibbs got up and examined Abby—who was shriveled into a ball in her chair.

"Gibbs..." she practically mouthed.

_She tried moving her heavy head. The car was moving. The driver's eyes bore right through her._

Abby tightened herself.

_Those dark, bottomless eyes... The cold, cold skin, like marble._

She wanted to suffocate herself. She hugged her knees until she couldn't feel anything.

_Yellow warehouse lights swirled into view again... The pain... Everything._

It all made sense now.

*** *** *** ***

"Gibbs isn't picking up..." McGee tapped his foot.

Tony opened his mouth.

"Tony..." he eyed him.

The senior agent's face screwed up and he hissed like a cat. "I was gonna say, try Ziva. She's watching the whole show."

McGee had covered one of his ears with his finger after "Ziva." The dial tone rang three times before he reached the mossad officer. "Ziva?"

"Where are you?" Ziva asked in a strange, distracted tone.

McGee stated their location.

There was silence on the line.

"Ziva...?" His eyes darted from side to side.

A few more moments of silence passed before he heard Ziva utter something disapprovingly. Another moment later, Ziva replied, "We may not be dealing with a murder, McGee."

Some semblance of hope glimmered inside McGee. Arnold Knight continued to stare at him, however, and erased any trace of it. "We found another body," he dropped. "We believe he's related to Seaman Knight."

A long pause. McGee could barely breathe—his anticipation was palpable in the air around him.

"I should be there..." Ziva lowered to a hush, but in the same distracted tone.

"We all should be here," McGee agreed. He wavered, but added, "For Abby."

"Yes," Ziva nodded in McGee's head. "She should see the body, too. She could identify him."

McGee grimaced. "Why? And how? Does she remember everything?"

Ziva sighed the unknown disapproval she'd uttered before. "She's recalling _some_thing," she snapped.

McGee frowned with a raised brow. "Get Gibbs and Ducky over here, too, ASAP," he said anyway.

Ziva hung up.

*** *** *** ***

"Oh my god, oh my god—"

"Abby," he begged. He strode to her.

A step ahead him, Abby sprang back to life and ran headlong into Gibbs. Her head and fists crashed into his chest.

"Make it go away, Gibbs! Make it go away!"

She was trying so hard not to let the rest of her fall to pieces. Her body shook under Gibbs' firm embrace.

"You remember," he said. His gut confirmed it; it was something else that upset him.

"Dammit! I probably washed away everything by now – how the heck could I...?" Abby cried out. "I'm so stupid..." She squeezed his waist. Her heart pounded against his chest. "I should've beaten him with a fucking baseball bat—sliced him with a saw—bashed his head—ripped his—" she rambled in a distraught, silent scream.

Gibbs held Abby back, but didn't completely sever himself from her. He looked hard into her eyes: they were framed with a bubbling misery, but her eyes slowly started to burn with an unquenchable fire.

Her cheeks burned red, and she bowed and shook her head. Gibbs held her chin up with his fingers and stared at her with longing.

A tremor shook her lips.

"He's dead," he squeezed her shoulders.

Abby shook her head more furiously and pulled away from him. More tremors running through her limbs, she held herself again. Abby covered her face; her breaths were short and jagged.

"He raped me."

Gibbs' arms fell to his sides.

The intercom crackled with a second of static. "Gibbs. Your phone. _Gibbs._"

Abby raised her head and eyed him, the flame in her eyes accented by the delicate droplets from her lashes.

Gibbs shoved his hand down his pocket and mechanically tilted his head down to check his silent phone. He answered. "_What_."

A few stutters and sputters later, and the probie was talking. Gibbs glanced at Abby, then hung up without further word. "Ziva, head out."

He started walking. He tried ignoring the wrath spreading in his chest like a...like a stab in the heart—the pain unbearable, his anger pouring out like blood. He saw himself in the glass and tried to ignore the agonized yet incensed stare he shot at himself. But most of all, he tried with all his might not to dwell on what his sadistic imagination was showing: Abby pushed and shoved and violated again and again and again and again...

"Wait—" Abby embraced his warm arm and pulled him back. "Wherever you're going let me come, Gibbs!"

His eyes widened. "_No._"

Her chest collapsed and her lips twisted. She threw his arm down. "Dammit, Gibbs, screw NCIS—I'm under _your_ custody! God knows how impossible it is to escape..." Her thoughts wandered for a moment.

He held her shoulders still. His hands slid down to her arms, to her elbows. "Abby..."

"Don't _Abby_ me."

"Abby," Gibbs stood his ground.

"I want to help!"

"I want you—_here_."

She crossed her arms and pouted against the wall. "_That_ had to do with me, didn't it?" she asked, referring to the phone call.

Gibbs blinked away more images from his mind. "_Did_ Seaman Jason Knight rape you?"

Abby tightened her crossed arms and looked at the plasma screen on the wall. _Those eyes..._ They couldn't have been Jason's, but they were the same color. Same dark hair... The whole revelation was hitting Abby harder as seconds passed. Was Jason a liar _and_ a rapist?

Was Gibbs being an unreasonable bastard...?

Unwillingly, Abby nodded, sniffling, blinking, and hiding her eyes. "Son of a bitch," she muttered. Abby sunk her head lower and lower. "We had iced tea—iced tea at a frickin' club. He wanted to buy a six-pack, I think, so we could drink it somewhere else…and that probably wasn't sugar he put…oh god. That's just…wrong." She shook her head, defeated. "We were both so _stupid_."

"Do you know who Arnold Knight is?" Gibbs changed the subject.

Abby thought a bit. "His brother, I think. Arnold. Yeah." She nodded. "He mentioned him in a few harmless anecdotes during our dinner…" Her head slowly rose and revealed a relentlessly scorching gaze. "_Why_?" she glared.

"He was found dead, in a warehouse close to where _you_ were found," Gibbs said.

"Warehouse..." Her lower lip curved downward, only to make her eyes turn cold. "I've never met him. For a while I thought he was fake." She looked at him. "Like everything else."

Gibbs tilted his head slightly and, slightly, his eyes narrowed.

Abby slit her eyes as well. "No, he wasn't there last night either. From what I remember."

Her boss continued to stare her down.

Those beady blue eyes were boiling the blood pulsing through her veins. Abby's hands began to shake, her eyes whitened with a simmering anger, and tension possessed the rest of her body once again. She put her fists on her hips. "Gibbs. I am _sick_ and _tired_ of being in here." Abby scrutinized him and squinted and tilted her head, copying him. "You're torn," she declared. "You wanna beat the crap out of someone right now...but you can't. And yet – " She shook her head. " – you don't trust me. That's sad, Gibbs."

The old bastard gave her a last look. "That's not—"

Abby stare-glared his mouth shut.

"That's..." he repeated. He frowned; he could feel the lines already etched into his skin become ravines on his face. His shaking head hung low. "It's not you, Abbs," he whispered.

He spun around before he could see the most likely crestfallen face Abby would wear. Ziva was probably still observing and "waiting," despite his order.

Gibbs locked the door; when he opened the door to the observation chamber, Ziva was, surprisingly, gone.

Abby, in his peripheral sight, stood motionless where he had left her. Giving up, the man gazed through the one-way glass and saw Abby trying to hold herself together. Her folded hands were over the red-thread heart on her black shirt. Her eyes were jade with misery, olive with anger, and somehow a soft emerald shade of something Gibbs had never seen from Abby... Her head tipped pensively.

Gibbs abandoned the rooms for the last time. He vowed, if the time came, he'd keep Abby safe elsewhere, closer to him. He hoped she would understand…

…Meanwhile, Abby had never seen Gibbs push the overprotective side of him before. What she felt when he left her a second time was indescribable; but as she watched him exit, she couldn't help feel sorry for him, strangely enough... It was strange that she hated Gibbs announcing his departure, when he would always ghost away without warning, like his usual magical self. No matter, she wanted to trace her fingers along the contours of his face. She'd always wanted to close his deep blue eyes with her fingertips and let them rest shut, as she simply embraced him, her embrace making everything else go away...

Out of the web of her thoughts, she heard the doorknob _click!_ and turn. Abby gasped and craned her neck.

The door opened to a sliver of a crack.

Abby jumped to it, nearly flew to the door, and peered out.

"Do what you must."

Abby blinked.

"Shh." The mossad officer's flowing black hair bounced when she turned to leave.

Abby watched, jaw unhinged, as Ziva jogged down the hallway. Whatever just happened took a while to register.

But once it did—

"Ziva," Abby grinned mischievously to herself, "you are officially my new best friend."

Overnight bag in hand, the Goth girl peeked out the interrogation room door before swinging it wide open. Hugging Bert in her other arm, Abby strode down the hall.

"I'll show you Gibbs..."

—_Ding!_

Lost in his thoughts, Gibbs walked into the squad room and headed for the sound of the opening elevator. His attention was divided between reality and the un-reality that Gibbs couldn't bear. He couldn't protect Abby from something that already happened. That hurt the most. Another frustrating, troubling feeling loomed over the special agent… He didn't want to believe Abby. The bastard that even dared to touch his Abby remained faceless, a black mask with a devilish smile; whenever he tried to see Seaman Knight in its place, Gibbs could only see the lacerated corpse on the autopsy table. Now that he remembered it, underneath the lipstick mark and the cuts, the sailor's face was placid, almost as if he were sleeping…

A hand wedged between the closing doors. Gibbs looked up from the floor.

Ziva's eyes cut through him. Her hand, still extended where it stopped the elevator doors, looked ready to strike. At this point, Gibbs was ready for anything she might throw at him; most likely he deserved it, he thought. The liaison stood beside Gibbs and pressed the close-door button. Every silent second that passed felt more painful than any hit Gibbs could imagine receiving then.

"Shoot, Ziva," Gibbs glanced at the ceiling.

Ziva adjusted the strap of her backpack and resisted. "You'll soon regret your actions," she said tensely. "I refuse to talk further with you."

Gibbs didn't bother asking.

*** *** *** ***

Minutes later, the sound of car doors slamming and swinging made McGee stand up. Tony was at the tool table, surveying tarnished metal with curiosity of a cat. The senior agent waved his hand away at McGee. "Get the door."

"I wouldn't touch anything," McGee said as he got up.

"I'm wearing gloves, McProbe, take a pill! It's all part of our case now."

The cyber agent rolled his eyes; he'd said that first. "Way to be original," he muttered.

McGee pushed open the door and was greeted by the NCIS truck and a silent Ziva. Her cap concealed her eyes, but her flat lips and erect pace made McGee step back and let her through. "Ziva," he said in place of a hello.

"McGee," she said normally, considering Ziva. "So this is the brother?"

"Uh, we…believe so," McGee said. "How did - ?"

"Abby told us," Ziva answered.

"Oh," he kept staring at Ziva and, more notably, the person approaching both of them.

"She's…busy at the moment," Ziva forced out at the moment Gibbs stood beside them. "Still back in NCIS." She looked away from Gibbs' presence.

Gibbs glanced at the body, secretly grateful that the face wasn't completely visible. The rest of the place possessed a haunted air about it that didn't settle well with his gut. The figments of his imagination started to play out on the dark, lime-stained, four-walled canvas set before him… Before he could lose himself again, Gibbs turned to Ziva's profile, the only part of her face she'd allow him to see. "Ziva. Help DiNozzo."

Ziva didn't respond.

"You can photograph the rest of the area," McGee struggled, with all the added tension clouding the air.

Unexpectedly, Ziva nodded. "I shall." She could have saluted him if she wanted; she was already marching toward Tony and his bottomless pit of inquisitiveness.

McGee stared.

"_McG_ee."

The agent gulped and blinked out of his novel musings. His boss had somehow gotten awfully close to his face.

Gibbs pointed and hissed, "You're with _me_."

*** *** *** ***

Abby tiptoed through the hallways and rode only in the back elevator. Once inside, she had a sudden urge to visit Ducky, her wise confidante who seemed like the only person who would listen to her now. The tugging at her heart and the growing spite against a certain silver-haired man pulled her fingers closer to the button. Another thought occurred to her and stopped her fingers instantly; he and Palmer were probably leaving to go to that warehouse.

"The warehouse..." Abby shook her head furiously. She didn't want to see anymore convoluted, drug-induced memories. She needed to see the evidence for herself—the photos didn't help, as much as that man tried. Moreover, she became curious to see who had replaced her caffeine-powered genius...

She pressed the button.

A minute later, Abby arrived at her lab's floor. The elevator doors made way for her, and Abby hurried down the corridor as fast as her Skelanimals flip-flops would allow her. The closer she got, the more she could hear her stereo playing a song—"Helena," to be exact, one of her guilty-pleasure tunes—and a trail of muffled voices—which grew louder and harsher with every flippy-floppy step.

"_...Well if you carry on this way // Things are better if I stay..."_

"You don't mind if I pulled your strings, do you...?"

"I said what are you _doing_ here?"

"_So long, and goodnight // So long, and goodnight..."_

Abby jumped and instinctively stuck to the closest wall like a fly. She was near the doorframe, but she couldn't see the arguing couple that was occupying her lab. The dominant voice was female, a little high-pitched under pressure, and was threatening her listener. Whoever else was in there was soft-spoken, possibly male from the pieces Abby picked out.

"Come on….for me." The male voice lowered his volume yet again.

"_...Can you...hear me...? // Are you...near me...?"_

"No—no, please," the female voice cracked, then followed the trend of the male's voice. "I can't—I won't cover up anything for you. You've done enough to ruin Jason's—_both_ of their lives."

"Evidently."

"_Can we pretend... // ...To leave, and then..."_

"...One more time—or else," the male spoke up.

"No." Her voice squeaked, barely audible, smothered by efforted breaths.

"_We'll meet again... //"_

_**Smack!**_

"AHHH—!"

"_...when both our cars collide."_

Abby panicked; patiently waiting for her unwelcome guests to leave was no longer an option. Ignoring the slightly unstable swagger in her hurried steps, Abby dropped her things and headed into the lab. She nearly collapsed at the abrupt roar that seemed to smack her in the face.

"Don't you DARE make me —!"

Abby froze.

The pretty, spunky-looking, unfortunate girl with the torn lip and glazed eyes, was a petrified ice sculpture on the floor. She was also wearing a lab coat.

But almost all her attention was transfixed on the man at the evidence table.

"You?" was the only thing Abby could push from her lips.

His eyes morphed into two black holes, drawing Abby closer against her better judgment. It was _his _eyes—pools of black. His marble skin bulged with popping veins in his neck and temple. His jaw clenched shut.

"_You_..." He pointed at her, part enraged, part surprised, and part disgusted.

"No...it can't be. Not you." Abby heard herself squeak. She saw herself back away from the man. She couldn't believe what was forming in her head. Abby touched her parted lips and gulped. _It wasn't him._

His fingers gripped the edge of the table and turned his already pale knuckles even whiter. He could have flipped the steel table over if he wanted.

Abby didn't have time to blink—the man flew—came into her face. His breath awakened her senses. His scent triggered a new, even sicker picture show in her mind. His hands brought the film strip to life...

The floor hit the back of her head as if struck with a piece of plywood.

"NOOOO!!! GET OFF ME, GET OFF ME!!!!" She scratched at his face and caught his wretched skin only once beneath her fingernails.

His body dominated her squirming one. Abby grabbed for his snug shirt, to no avail either. He straddled her waist and smothered her mouth and nose with something white and cottony, with a tingling, burning scent.

"You should have died," he murmured, in an eeriest tone, like he was hushing a child.

She screamed, breathed, choked—

And blacked out.

* * *

**A/N:**Just a side note - I like My Chemical Romance. Period. Any bashing of this band will not be tolerated. Do it somewhere else if you have the sudden urge. It's just that some of the ugly things I've seen on the internet are so disheartening and negative, just because a person likes a certain band/artist/character/ship/etc., and another person happens to abhor it/him/her/them. *sigh* Fin.

So...what do you think? One of my other friends actually already figured most of it out, lol. This is my first real "mystery" piece, so there's bound to be some holes. *hides shovel*

Questions, comments, concerns? Just one click away ;)

(~Annie)


	10. Chapter 10

A/N: Hey guys! FINALLY, the next chapter! I'm sorry to everyone for not writing for so long, and if anyone still reads or likes this story - you're amazing :) I had to re-read the past chapters to catch up with the story—I've gotten rusty on the details, so if something doesn't make sense, don't hesitate to point it out in a review ;] Anyway, great to be back, and thank you thank you so much for everyone's seat-clinging patience; the ending of that last chapter wasn't quite the best note to end on… (and don't ask why I made such a big deal over that MCR song; why'd I use that song? Don't ask.) Anyway, enjoy~!

* * *

_A sunset shone bright before them. Yellow streaked with orange and highlighted with red colored the entire wall of the sky._

_Abby held Jason tighter in her arms, while he did the same. The sun had never shone so bright before, at least not to either of them. She rested her head on his shoulder. They snuggled even closer together under the giant blanket they brought with them. The sun continued to slowly dip itself into the water._

Riiiing-riiing! Riiiing-riiiing!

"_Abby," Jason's voice failed to hide his disappointment._

_The Goth girl flinched and unwrapped herself from Jason. "It's probably no one, relax," she smiled. She left their spot and stepped over to her purse, which lay by the circle of stones that would house their campfire. When she checked her caller ID, guilt weighed her shoulders down, but at the same time, a flicker of joy danced across her face._

"_I know that look," Jason eyed her. He grinned at first; nevertheless, when he turned to gaze at the sunset, a crease was scored between his brows._

_Abby ignored him. She whispered to herself, "Gibbs."_

Abby stirred.

She tried to turn over and coughed a little. The more than firm surface beneath her pierced her back. A chill wind blew from above her, and goosebumps replaced the skin on her arms and legs. She embraced herself, filling her head with happy thoughts of golden skies and silver hair. Abby took a deep breath… Her eyes widened.

"Oh sh—!" Abby sat up too quickly.

Abby sat at the concrete edge of either an unfinished, more-than-five-story-soon-to-be building, or an abandoned parking lot, she still couldn't tell. She was too distracted by the distance separating her from the ground. Abby breathed in and out trying to keep calm and to not say "Oh my God" repeatedly, as she usually would do at times like this. She turned too quickly toward a shifting noise behind her in the darkness. Abby held her throbbing head, and an amused chuckle echoed against the concrete, unfinished walls haphazardly covered with plastic and tarp and other constructiony details. Abby made a mental note in the midst of her growing ire.

"I really thought Jason had a better taste in women," the vile man said as he approached her. The pale evening moonlight unveiled his disgusting face….his square jaw that jutted out of his head, his dark brown bed-hair, and his even darker irises that were now pure onyx pits. His black, v-necked, shortsleeved shirt hugged his muscular body.

Abby knew enough about Jason to brazenly say, "He had an even worse taste in men, apparently."

Sheldon the bartender laughed, unfazed. "Oh, you're so funny," he laughed. "By the way, _I_ drugged your drink—that _was_ sugar Jason used—and now," he dramatically paused, crouching down and holding Abby's jaw in his firm hand, "you're going to die. And I'll make sure you do." He moved her face and made sure she saw nothing but his eyes. "It's just you and me this time."

x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x

Anger welled up inside him like a balloon stretched to its limits. The silence in Director Vance's office began to grow unbearably annoying.

_BANG!_

"_AN_SWER ME!" Gibbs smacked the table.

Jamie Leigh looked at her lap as if trying to hide her wounded, bandaged face.

The moment Gibbs received an emergency call from both Ducky, and subsequently Director Vance, he left the second crime scene. Through unfortunately bad timing, Ducky went up to see Ms. Leigh before he and Palmer left for the second body in this case, only to find her alone and on the floor coming in and out of consciousness. It was then that security concluded that Ms. Leigh's ex-boyfriend, Sheldon Blake, carried off Abby and escaped through a back entrance. By now, the rest of the team would be coming back to NCIS, awaiting a plan of action to save his Abby—their Abby.

"Well?" Gibbs roared.

"I thought my personal life was irrelevant, Agent Gibbs," Jamie finally answered, still not looking at him. "I didn't know Sheldon swung both ways and was involved with Jason in more ways than I'd like to imagine…at least not 'til today."

Gibbs shifted his fiery stare at the director.

"Agent Gibbs," Vance started, "if you even fathom about losing your temper with me—"

"_No_, Vance." The special agent shot out of his chair and started pacing close to the exit. "I'm only upset because a homicidal _bar_tender decided he can screw with my people!" He stopped pacing and stopped short of the director. "I can't _imagine _losing my temper over that. _Sir._"

Vance squinted, his eyelids as tight as the restraint on his own temper. "What about the new victim?"

"That's," Jamie instantly answered, "Jason's brother, Arnold..." She spoke slowly after Gibbs threw her a paralyzing look. "They all went to college together...but I heard Sheldon had a falling out with Jason this year, so he...so he spent more time with Arnold..." Tears began to choke the victimized girl. "Oh God. I always thought Jason and Arnold were just Sheldon's _friends_. He would always talk about them...I never knew...I never knew he..."

Just before Gibbs could fully lose it, Vance literally held Gibbs back with his hand. "Start talking, Ms. Leigh. Something you _should_ have done before I called you here..."

"Indeed, sir, forgive me," Jamie wiped a few more tears. In the midst of them, she choked, "I'm sorry, Agent Gibbs—"

"Don't," Gibbs stopped her. "Don't apologize..." Enough tears today have moved him in a thousand directions. "...it's a sign of weakness..."

Back at the bullpen, Ziva was petrified with guilt. McGee observed from his desk, worried; he thought Ziva's skin would crack if he tried to poke her with a pencil, she seemed so still. She stared somewhere beyond the keyboard at her desk. Tony was at the plasma, gathering everything they knew about the entire case, including the second crime scene.

"So," Tony interjected, almost shouted. "According to Ducky...Arnold Knight was killed about an hour or so after Gibbs and I were at Plush 9 this afternoon—by that bastard at the bar." The agent made a face and, crossing his arms, growled next, "Arnold Knight didn't come up in any of our databases, so the dogtags must have been some kind of gift shop souvenir. None of the evidence has come back from the lab yet….but I'm pretty damn sure we have our guy." Tony came back to his desk and grimaced some more. "I knew he couldn't be for real. Sheldon. What kind of name is _Sheldon_?"

McGee eyed his partner. Usually, he could let Tony's antics pass up to a point, but right now he couldn't. "Who cares_?_" Tim walked up to Tony and stole the plasma remote.

"Hey!" Tony tried to snatch it back.

McGee clicked the remote; the mugshot Sheldon Blake appeared on the screen along with background info. "This wackjob already had a restraining order issued by Seaman Knight, on top of past instances of stalking both women _and _men…"

Tony blinked and shook his head. "Something's wrong about that."

"…but why would he want to kill Abby and Seaman Knight?"

"The bartending gig was a farce," Tony grumbled.

"You can say that," McGee said, "'cuz another screw up like this would put him behind bars…again."

"He almost swept it all under the rug, that _scum_bag…" Tony seethed.

"And now…with Jamie and Gibbs in Vance's office," McGee sighed, "and nobody in the lab to look at the new evidence—"

"Abby's gone. Because of me."

Tony and McGee both turned to Ziva. "It's not your fault, Ziva," Tony uttered. Tim nodded.

Ziva still hit her desk and rose. "I let her out of the room against Gibbs's strict orders. I feel that I am as responsible as the kidnapper."

"Why'd you do it?" Tony asked.

The Israeli pummeled Tony with her glare. "Gibbs reduced Abby to a caged animal—_don't _tell me otherwise, Tony," she interrupted Tony's opening mouth with her pointing finger, "because I _always_ knew Abby was innocent."

"Maybe Gibbs kept her there to protect her," McGee said. It wouldn't be out of his character to do that. Underneath the silent gruffness that is Gibbs, there are good intentions, he thought.

Ziva stared at McGee for the longest time.

"Mhmm," Tony cleared his throat and looked up. "I believe all will be set right prett-tee soon…"

Everyone followed his eyes and saw Gibbs trailing down the stairs, followed by a bandaged Jamie. Jamie silently made her way to the back elevator and avoided eye contact with most of them—McGee was able to snag a guilty glance from the forensic specialist, before she disappeared into the shadows.

"_Mc_Gee—"

Everyone turned, but McGee especially whipped around and stood breaths from Gibbs. The look on his face reminded Tim of a wolf in the alpine wilderness, gazing at the snowy road ahead. Or as Abby probably would have described him...a fox a pounce away from his prey. Either way, the intimidating glare nearly made McGee sick.

"—pull up the security footage from the lab and the yard entrance. Now." Gibbs walked up to the plasma. "That bastard couldn't have gone far."

Tony, still sour, muttered, "Our security stinks—" _Smack! _"—ow."

A window appeared with the security camera feed from outside Abby's lab. Much to the team's confusion, Sheldon entered the lab through the elevator, like anyone else would. Gibbs wiped a palm down his face. "Jamie…" he muttered.

"_Jamie_ let him in?" Tim questioned, astonished.

"Sheldon Blake is Jamie's…" Gibbs answered through tight lips. "…_and_ Seaman Knight's ex."

Everyone else's jaws fell to the floor. "He's bisexual," Ziva spoke rather than questioned.

"Or in denial," Tony grimaced.

"That…" McGee collected his thoughts. "..._would_ make sense for a motive. He sees Seaman Knight with Abby. Gets jealous." He shrugged. "Tries to kill them."

Gibbs nearly divulged what Abby said in her frenzied state. He'd find out for himself once they catch Sheldon; suddenly, Gibbs panicked inside over Abby's safety and what that pervert might do to her again…

"But that doesn't explain the second killing," McGee said.

Ziva thought about it. "Maybe the brother knew too much."

"He did," Gibbs said.

"Jamie," McGee guessed but was pretty sure she was the one who told Gibbs.

Staring at the screen, Tony reviewed everyone's locations aloud. "Wait wait wait...Abby was in interrogation, and we were all at the second crime scene…"

Gibbs checked the time on the bottom corner of the screen. "You and McGee only," he said. "Ziva and I were just leaving Abby..." He looked over at the officer briefly, but the touch of his glance bored through Ziva. "Fast-forward."

McGee typed his command; Sheldon and Jamie's argument escalated in a matter of seconds before Abby appeared in the footage. "_Stop._" Gibbs held out his hand. The mute struggle unfolded in clear black and white.

"She put up a fight," Tony said, eyes fixed on the screen.

"But how did he escape the building?" McGee asked.

Sheldon carried the incapacitated Abby in his arms instead of over his shoulder, but it still bothered Gibbs greatly. The two left the shot and left the team with an empty hallway.

"Check Ducky's feed," Gibbs ordered.

In a few seconds, a window from the camera by the morgue appeared. Both the hallway and the morgue were pitch black.

Gibbs growled in his throat. "Rewind."

"What?" Tony was standing next to Gibbs now.

"Look," McGee pointed.

Right before the morgue lights were shut off, Sheldon crept in the upper corner of the screen, this time with Abby slung like a shoulder bag.

"He escaped through the second elevator, inside the morgue," Gibbs said.

"Now what?" Tony went back to his desk and sat at the corner of it.

Gibbs stared at him.

McGee went into action before his boss could look at him. "I'll pull up security footage from all vehicular entrances in the yard."

"You won't need to." Gibbs pulled out a slip of paper and slapped it on McGee's desk. "License number for Sheldon's car.

"So, traffic cameras?"

"_Uh _huh," Gibbs said and turned to Tony again.

"I…can go to the lab and see if Jamie has anything on Arnold Knight—" Tony power-walked toward the back elevator.

Which left Ziva with Gibbs.

"Ziva."

The mossad looked at Gibbs with childlike fear, fear of the unknown, imminent punishments about to happen. "What I did was wrong," she admitted and looked at Gibbs' shirt the last second.

"I know."

Ziva looked at him.

"What I did was unforgivable." Gibbs kept his eyes on the floor, then looked back at Ziva.

A heaviness in Ziva evaporated. "She will forgive you." The mossad touched his shoulder.

"Got it!" McGee announced and clicked his mouse.

Before they could look at the screen, Gibbs' phone rang...and it echoed in his mind.

"Ziva, McGee gear up, go," he ordered on his way to his desk.

"Go where?" The tech-agent geared-up on command but still asked.

"To _get Abby_," Gibbs barked. "I'll follow."

"But, boss, it's just the intersection," McGee referred to the screen.

"Then go there and find her—" Gibbs picked up the phone and frowned, "Yeah, Gibbs."

"_Special Agent Gibbs?_"

McGee couldn't move—the look on Gibbs face kept him from leaving the bullpen. Ziva was heading for the elevator when she noticed the two motionless men and stopped as well.

"_Gibbs! GIBBS!" _Another voice on the line shouted in the background.

"Abbs?" Gibbs paled.

"_Shut up!" _Sharp struggling sounds went on for a second before the original voice returned. "_Looking for your precious lab rat, old man?"_

McGee hurried back to his desk and started to rapidly type at his computer while keeping an eye on Gibbs. Ziva came to the edge of the bullpen and craned her neck.

"You listen to me, you son of a bitch—" the special agent growled and pointed at an imaginary Sheldon.

"—_no you better listen to me, Gibbs_," the man laughed, "_or I'll blow the bitch's head off."_

Gibbs paused for a long time. "You're bluffing."

"_Try me. Someone's going to die, and it'll be too late for you and your team."_

"Gibbs, if you could stay on the line for just thirty seconds more…" McGee stage whispered.

"Oh, yeah," Gibbs spoke. "I'll make sure it's you."

Sheldon's laugh sent uncomfortable shivers through Gibbs. He remembered the bartender was young, and he thought the guy was going somewhere after his bartending days were done. Gibbs guessed he was right about one thing: Sheldon was going to jail. Or die. Whichever comes first.

"_Keep dreaming, Agent Gibbs,"_ he laughed. "_I bet you're dying to know where we are."_

"I will find you, Sheldon." Gibbs leaned on his desk and loomed over the phone cradle.

"_Seriously. How?_"

"Wouldn't you like to know..." He eyed McGee, who signaled Gibbs to talk a bit longer.

Sheldon couldn't stop laughing—one more amused note from his mouth would incense the special agent like a wildfire. "_Would _you _like to know what fun I'm having with your lab rat..."_

"_**Clank-clank-clank!**_" A cacophonous noise emerged in the background seconds later.

"_Shh—no!" _Gibbs could hear struggling noises again. "_Stop it, bitch!"_

"_Let—go of me—!"_

"—_OW!"_

"_Gibbs, I'm right here, I'm at a—_BLAM!_ Beeeeeeep…"_ The line went dead.

"Abbs—!" Gibbs uttered too late. "Dammit—McGee—!"

"I was able to get their location—"

"_And?_"

"They're at a navy construction site…" McGee told Gibbs and Ziva the address.

"Guess he couldn't get too far with our _stinky _security," Ziva commented. She checked and clicked her gun with a smile on her face. "How convenient."

* * *

A/N: Honestly, my writing's a bit rusty, so critiques are especially welcome :]


	11. Chapter 11

A/N: Hey guys :) Thanks to everyone who reviewed and said hi again. I'm thinking this story is coming close to the end…do you think this story has any sequel potential? If there was a sequel, it'd probably be more Gabby-centered than on a case, but who knows. Comment/review on what ya think ;] Enjoy…

_Clank-clank-clank!_

"This is the least I can do," Abby thought. She couldn't move her mouth without the risk of Sheldon tightening his hand around her jaw, or worse her neck...though she was tempted to bite those pale fingers of his.

Hands tied behind her back with one of Sheldon's shirtsleeves, Abby had been pinned against a cement wall and could see the muted color of the sky behind the billowing sheets of plastic and tarp hanging by the building's skeleton. Sheldon was definitely calling Gibbs just to taunt him—the sneer on the bartender's face gave him away before he spoke.

"Try me. Someone's going to die, and it'll be too late for you and your team."

His subsequent laugh was comparable to a hyena's. It disgusted Abby.

"Wouldn't _you _like to know what fun I'm having with you lab rat..." Sheldon leaned in and inhaled her unusual, arousing scent of gunpowder. His lips came closer to her skin, his tongue even closer.

It was fortunate that a small pile of thin pipes were at her feet. So she kicked them.

"Shh—no!" Sheldon snarled and clenched her throat. "Stop it, bitch!"

Air was being squeezed out of her mercilessly. "Let—" Abby choked. "—go of me—!" She kneed him in the groin and kicked him away. His cell phone skipped and tumbled away on the cement. Abby fell next to it—Sheldon tackled her down. "Gibbs, I'm right here! I'm at a—!"

_BLAM! _

Abby froze, as if the perforated cell phone would electrocute her. Her tackler flipped her over and straddled her, pointing a gun at her face.

Sheldon sighed. "Why don't we...try this again?" A sick grin replaced his irritated face. "No gloves. No drugs. No resistance." He stuck the gun under her chin. "Or else." His free hand caressed her neck and traveled down her shoulder and lingered at her breast.

Abby spat in his face. Sheldon shuddered back and wiped his eyes.

"I'd rather die." She squinted at him. "_Fruit_cake."

The bartender's eyes were black pits of ire. "You said it," he muttered—and fired the gun.

x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x

_That's it, _thought Gibbs. _I have to tell her. _After this, he decided he would finally reveal to Abby how he truly felt about her. He couldn't deny it anymore. He didn't know, didn't want to know when another chance like this would arise. _Why couldn't I tell her before? When she wasn't in the hands of a killer? When she was safe, with me? _Gibbs pressed the gas harder.

At the wheel, the agent felt like going 125 down the freeway, but the rest of his team riding passenger knew he was going at least 40 mph below that. McGee sat at shotgun, clenching the armrest and sitting erect. The needle kept slowly reaching the 100 mark, but Gibbs still felt like he wasn't going fast enough. The construction site was, according to McGee, on Shannon Pl., oddly enough.

Finally, the ominous cement skeleton loomed outside the car, and the dim evening sky added more to the site's menacing appearance. The car screeched to a stop at the curb, and all of them jumped out. Gibbs stared up at one of the upper levels, while Tony, McGee and Ziva awaited orders.

"You think they're up there, boss?" Tony asked.

Before Gibbs could stare at him, McGee answered, "Probably. If they were right there—" He pointed at the darkness that was the first floor. "—then we would've heard something by now."

"Or not," Ziva speculated. "Abby could be forced not to speak."

Gibbs took one step toward the building, and everyone was silent.

"No," he said. "She'd put up a fight…" Something dark and thin that appeared on the fifth story caught Gibbs' eye. "Do you see that?" he pointed.

Tony and Ziva peered, while McGee magically pulled out a pair of binoculars. "You keep binoculars in your pants or something, McScout?"

"It's…" McGee ignored Tony. "…oil?"

"Gimme that—" Tony snatched them and looked. "Uh, some kind of liquid trailing down the cement…" He spoke more slowly as his face grew paler.

"Blood," Gibbs and Ziva said.

Everyone unholstered their weapons.

"Ziva, cover, Tony, check the back," Gibbs ordered, "McGee—" He tossed the agent the car keys. "—stand guard if he tries to make an escape." Gibbs eyed the sedan that was parked across the street and saw Sheldon's plate.

Ziva and Gibbs pulled out flashlights they had taken from the car and shone them while staying armed, stealthily crossing through the bottom floor. "There," the mossad spotted the staircase, which seemed stable enough to climb. Miraculously, they flew over them and didn't crack the cement.

At the fifth floor, Gibbs caught a glimpse of the pool of blood that made the stream they saw below. The two agents immediately flanked the nearest wall, staying out of sight. Silence. Only the wind-brushed plastic and tarp made a sound.

Ziva, in front of Gibbs, crouched down and checked. "Clear," she gasped.

The two of them rushed out and froze, aiming their guns at an empty pool of blood…and the woman lying next to it.

"ABBY!" Gibbs roared and ran to the less bloody body.

Still in her pajama pants and broken-heart shirt—now stained with an grapefruit-sized, crimson blotch next to her shoulder—Abby's eyes opened wide to Gibbs's voice. She tried to get up, but her wound pushed her back down. "I'm—alive," she winced.

He ran and knelt at her side to grip her free hand—her other held a handgun. "Abbs?" Gibbs eyed the weapon, but looked back into her frightened eyes.

She was trying her best not to blubber again, but Abby had trouble speaking. "Gibbs—he's still here," she gasped. "Ah—" she bit her lip, wincing again when Gibbs pressed above her wound. "These are his, not mine." She held up the gun and pointed at the blood pool with her chin. The pool was smaller than he thought, and a thread-like trail led around the corner past the stair entrance, to the other side of the floor.

Gibbs nodded and understood. "Ziva." He motioned for her with his head. "Watch Abby." He got up and checked his gun. Ziva stared at him a second, but Gibbs only nodded. "I can take him."

_BANG—pow—pow—pow! _A single bullet tore through the night air and it seemed to have ricocheted off the cement.

"Stay with her!" Gibbs shouted and ran.

He flanked the corner and checked over his covering wall, then moved out and scanned the whole other side of the empty floor. It was seemingly empty. The dark trail continued to a dark crook in the wall. One step later, and Gibbs saw a body being flipped onto the cement and a second gunman pointing a weapon.

"Freeze, _fruitcake_!" Tony barked and aimed at his victim.

Gibbs saw the spineless man struggling to get up, but he had lost considerable blood. Sheldon Blake stumbled across the floor, fell against a pillar…and started laughing. It was the most grating sound he'd ever heard.

"What's so funny, Sheldon?" Gibbs asked as he walked closer to the killer.

Sheldon lifted his spare pistol and held it to his temple. Gibbs and Tony stepped back.

"Tell me, Agent Gibbs," he grinned, "did you think someone like me could cause so much damage?"

Gibbs still had his weapon pointed at him. "Why?" he simply asked.

The pistol shook in the bartender's hand; blood started to form on the ground he sat upon. Sheldon wiped a hand across his chest and looked at his red hand. "I'm going to die, Agent Gibbs. Does it really matter why I did what I did anymore?"

"We can take you Bethesda," Gibbs said.

"But after that, you're talking," Tony added.

A sad smile formed on Sheldon's face—Gibbs almost felt sorry for him. The killer stared at his blood for a long time. "You can't treat this—any of this," he gestured to his whole self. His eyes glinted in the evening light. "I'm infected. Need I say more?" Gibbs stared him down, but Sheldon shook his head. "Don't worry about your lab rat—she's clean."

"_You_ raped her?" Gibbs had a feeling, but he couldn't believe it.

Sheldon smiled again; he put down his pistol. "Shoot me."

"Tell us, Sheldon," Gibbs said, holding back most of his anger in his voice. "Tell us everything."

Sheldon searched through Gibbs's eyes. "You already know everything," he said. "Jason ruined my life, the Goth needed to know the real side of him, and Arnold would never understand."

"He was going to rat you out," Tony spoke.

"You can say that," Sheldon answered, glaring at the other agent. "I told him the next morning, during our usual coffee date…don't know why." He seemed lost in the memory, but he quickly looked back at Gibbs. "See? What's the point, Agent Gibbs?"

"You tell me," Gibbs answered.

Angered tears gradually welled and flooded Sheldon's eyes. "Jason wasn't the one who infected me," he said, "but he infected just about everything else. I wasn't going to take his bi crap…after all those years… I wandered from person to person, trying to see what he sees in _everyone_ apparently. And after I found out I was going to die, guess who shows up at the bar? How can anyone be so damn happy with someone else?"

"It's very possible," Gibbs said, instantly thinking of his girl bleeding around the corner.

Sheldon gave him a pained gaze. "Not for me, Agent Gibbs. Not for me." He held the pistol to his head and closed his eyes.

"Don't—" Gibbs and Tony yelled.

_BANG!_

Sheldon Blake slumped to the floor and lay in his blood. Gibbs wiped a hand down his damp face; he couldn't look at the twisted, satisfied grin of death the bartender wore now and forever.

The agent sighed. "Call Ducky. I'm taking Abbs to Bethesda."


End file.
